INDIA bloc meeting: BJP claims opposition alliance is crumbling

BJP leader Shivraj Singh Chouhan claimed the INDIA bloc is divided over Rahul Gandhi’s leadership after several leaders skipped its meeting in New Delhi. Opposition parties, meanwhile, discussed a joint action plan over alleged irregularities in electoral-roll revision

New Delhi: The BJP claimed that the INDIA bloc is crumbling and that its leaders have rejected Rahul Gandhi’s leadership after Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and other leaders skipped the alliance’s Wednesday meeting.

“Leave the INDIA bloc aside; even Congress leaders and members of the party are not willing to accept Rahul Gandhi as their leader. Rahul himself, during Congress Working Committee meetings, keeps pleading: ‘Accept me as your leader, trust me’,” Union minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told reporters here.

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Chouhan’s remarks came after INDIA bloc leaders met here to finalise an action plan for a joint agitation over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

The Congress asserted that the Opposition stands united to protect the Constitution from “repeated assaults” by the Modi government, including what it called its “vote chori gameplan” to remain in power.

While the DMK and the AAP skipped the meeting, Akhilesh Yadav also did not attend, citing nominations for Rajya Sabha polls in Uttar Pradesh.

Chouhan said, “The INDIA alliance fell apart even before the meeting took place. The DMK is not attending the meeting. Akhilesh is busy elsewhere. The AAP had already declined.”

Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray said he would join virtually, Chouhan said.

“Why is this happening? It is because the INDIA alliance is simply not willing to accept Rahul Gandhi-ji as its leader. His leadership is not being accepted; that is why they are not even showing up,” the BJP leader said.

“How can the country accept someone as a leader whom the Congress party itself does not?” Chouhan wondered.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, former party chiefs Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, AICC general secretaries Jairam Ramesh and K C Venugopal, TMC’s Mamata Banerjee, and leaders from the SP, CPI, CPI(M), NCP(SP) and Shiv Sena (UBT), among others, attended the meeting.

“An accurate voter list is the soul of democracy, and if incorrect names are included in it, democracy will perish. I want to ask the Congress party what objection could you possibly have to the removal of the name of someone who is no longer alive from the voter list?” Chouhan said.

For a “pristine democracy”, the voter list must be accurate, the minister stressed.

“What is the problem if a name is removed from one location in cases of duplication? Why should the name of someone who is not even a citizen of the country be included in the voter list?” he added.