Blow to Opp: Mamata may skip Sonia meet

Forming a unified Opposition against the BJP seems to be a tricky affair as cracks have already begun to appear among Opposition parties. The Trinamul Congress has dealt the first blow to the unity initiative by mounting pressure to make its leader and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee the face of the Opposition, sources said.

In a strong message to the Opposition parties, particularly the Congress, Ms Banerjee will skip the Opposition meeting called by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi on February 1 and a dinner on February 9.

The West Bengal chief minister had also skipped a meeting called by Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar on Monday. The party claimed that it had not been invited.

Trinamul sources said that since the meeting

has been called by Mrs Gandhi, who is the Congress Parliamentary Party leader, the TMC will send its own parliamentary party leaders Derek O’ Brien from the Rajya Sabha and Sudip Bandopadhyay from the Lok Sabha to the meeting.

In Kolkata, party sources indicated that the Trinamul supremo may not attend the Opposition event due to her preoccupation with the Budget Session of Assembly.

Though officially the party maintained that the West Bengal chief minister is not available till February 20, it is evident that the TMC supremo is asserting her claim over the leadership of any anti- BJP Opposition alliance. “It is only natural that only someone with impeccable credentials can play the lead role in 2019,” Trinamul national spokesperson Mr ‘ O’ Brien said. Trinamul, it seems, has indicated to Congress leaders that the leader of the proposed Opposition alliance should be a sitting chief minister or a former Union minister or chief of a political party.

In the current scenario, the only chief ministers who fill the bill are Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik and Ms Banerjee .

Trinamul sources also questioned the absence of Arvind Kejriwal- led AAP from the Opposition unity plank. On Tuesday, the party sent its representative MP Dinesh Trivedi to a programme called by senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha and Shatrughan Sinha but skipped a book release function of Congress leader and former finance minister P. Chidambaram.

Mounting more pressure on the Congress, the TMC has also refused a seat- sharing offer from the Congress in Tripura. Sources said that the Congress had offered TMC five seats in Tripura, all in the tribal belt. The Congress also wanted Ms Banerjee to campaign for it in Tripura. However, Trinamul sources maintained that the Congress was playing “high- handed” and it was not interested in any such alliance as a junior partner.