Congress to take up Nitish U-turn, attack on Rahul

NEW DELHI: Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s move to dump the grand alliance and seek renewal of ties with the BJP besides the attack on Rahul Gandhi in Gujarat will dominate the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting on Tuesday.

The meeting, to be chaired by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, takes place on the day of the results of the Rajya Sabha elections in Gujarat. BJP chief Amit Shah, Union minister Smriti Irani and senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel are contesting the polls. While the BJP is certain to win two berths in the Upper House, Patel’s contest on the third seat has become a prestige issue for both the Congress and the ruling party. Though not on the agenda circulated among its members, the CWC meeting will discuss yet another of threadbare Kumar’s political somersaults in reviving his ties with the BJP.

In 2013, Kumar had snapped his 17-year ties with the BJP which named Narendra Modi its prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

He later joined hands with his bitter rival of two decades Lalu Prasad to form a coalition government in Bihar in the 2015 assembly polls. With Kumar, who was widely seen as the opposition’s face for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, moving to the BJP camp, CWC members are likely to discuss the strategy to keep the non-NDA parties united.

The attack on Rahul Gandhi’s vehicle in Gujarat last week will also figure in the discussions, especially in view of his proposed visits to the state in the run-up to the assembly elections scheduled for November-December this year.

As the meeting takes place on the 75th anniversary of the historic ‘Quit India’ movement, the CWC is likely to pass a resolution to commemorate the event in a bid to corner the BJP on nationalism. Congress leaders have repeatedly argued that the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which is the ideological mentor of the BJP, was not even a part of the freedom struggle but its leadership continues to give lessons on nationalism.