Kejriwal will seek support from Mamta

Kolkata (IANS) | Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will meet his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday and seek her support against the central government’s ordinance setting aside the Supreme Court order handing over control of administrative services in the national capital to AAP. The two chief ministers are scheduled to meet at the state secretariat in Nabanna on Tuesday afternoon. According to sources in the state unit of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Kejriwal may seek the support of the Trinamool Congress to stop the Centre’s ordinance in the Rajya Sabha.

After the meeting, both the leaders are going to hold a joint press conference. AAP sources said Kejriwal has already approached leaders of opposition parties and chief ministers of non-BJP ruled states to seek their support and Tuesday’s meeting with Mamata Banerjee is part of that exercise.

BJP’s national vice-president and party’s Lok Sabha member Dilip Ghosh, however, made fun of the meeting. He called it a futile exercise by the opposition parties to project a credible face against Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Ghosh said, in 2019, Mamata Banerjee herself tried to become the face and hence she organized a meeting of opposition party leaders in Kolkata. But after that his party lost in many constituencies in West Bengal in 2019. This time she is scared to present herself. That’s why she is holding meetings with the leaders of other opposition parties.

Recently, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his deputy Tejashwi Yadav visited Kolkata and held a meeting with Mamata Banerjee.

After the meeting, both Banerjee and Kumar emphasized that all anti-BJP forces should act with an open mind and shed their arrogance to establish a grand-opposition alliance in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Earlier, Samajwadi Party leader and Leader of Opposition in Uttar Pradesh Assembly Akhilesh Yadav also met the Chief Minister in South Kolkata.

Both Banerjee and Yadav stressed on strengthening the unity of regional parties to take on the BJP in 2024.

–IANS