Sonia Gandhi Invites Opposition Leaders for “Defeat Modi” Dinner
Although the country is facing severe crisis on all the social and economic fronts, it is becoming increasingly difficult for opposition parties to defeat Modi even in state elections.
By Rakesh Raman
Sonia Gandhi – the former president of India’s Congress party and the mother of present Congress chief Rahul Gandhi – has invited leaders of all opposition parties for dinner on March 13.
They are supposed to chalk out a strategy to defeat Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his party BJP in the Lok Sabha election scheduled to take place in 2019.
Although most opposition leaders have diametrically different views on many areas of national interest, the one-point agenda of their union is to dethrone Modi.
However, the move is not likely to work because Modi’s popularity is increasing across the country which is manifested in BJP’s recent victories in most state elections such as Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, and North East including Meghalaya, Nagaland, and Tripura.
RMN Poll
Meanwhile, in an ongoing RMN Poll, only 18% people are satisfied with the work of PM Modi. You can also participate in the poll and see the results.
Although the country is facing severe crisis on all the social and economic fronts, it is becoming increasingly difficult for opposition parties to defeat Modi even in state elections.
In a recent attempt, a former minister in India and rebel BJP leader Yashwant Sinha had also launched a political outfit National Forum which was supposed to expose the irregularities in the Modi government.
Yashwant Sinha had roped in some disgruntled politicians from BJP (including an actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha) as well as from opposition parties who were eager to join National Forum.
Although it was positioned as a non-political group, its main target was PM Modi with the aim to defeat him and his party BJP in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
But National Forum proved to be a stillborn project and is already dormant before even making its presence felt in the Indian political arena.
[ Read: Yashwant Sinha’s Anti-Modi National Forum Is Dead ]
Now Sonia Gandhi’s dinner meeting will help the opposition leaders create a common plank in order to take on Modi and his party BJP inside and outside the Parliament.
In the ongoing Parliament session, for example, the opposition parties are together raising a slew of questions against the Modi government. These include multiple financial scams, farmers’ troubles, and growing unemployment in the country.
This article is part of our new editorial section that focuses on Lok Sabha Election 2019 in India.
Earlier, Sonia Gandhi had said that her party is ready to have alliances with other parties to ensure that BJP is defeated in the next Lok Sabha election and India is restored to a democratic, inclusive, secular, tolerant, and economically progressive path.
By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. He is the founder of a humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society.
