INDIA bloc says it is geared up to face the BJP

AICC President Mallikarjun Kharge, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, and Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar during press meet in Bengaluru.
| Photo Credit: SUDHAKARA JAIN

The Opposition parties in the INDIA bloc welcomed the Lok Sabha election dates and said they were prepared to take on the BJP and unseat it from power. The Congress said it would fight for “nyay” (justice) to the country and its people, while the Left parties said their primary objective was to remove the BJP from power. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) appealed to voters to vote against dictatorship and hooliganism.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said in a social media post that the 2024 Lok Sabha election would open the “door of nyay” for India. “This would be perhaps the last chance to save democracy and our Constitution from dictatorship. We, the people of India, will together fight against hatred, loot, unemployment, price rise and atrocities,” he said.

Later, speaking to reporters in Bengaluru, he questioned the seven-phase poll schedule and quipped that Prime Minister Narendra Modi wanted to tour everywhere. He said the polls could have been completed in three or four phases. “We are not anxious about what is going to happen, but Mr. Modi putting seven phases, it means that he wants to tour everywhere. In this country, I have also contested nearly 12 elections and there hardly used to be four phases. Sometimes it used to be even one phase. I have seen two phases also but maximum it used to be four,” he said. He said all works would be stopped for 70-80 days during the election, materials would not be supplied, and budgets would not be spent. “So, according to me, this is not good,” Mr. Kharge said.

Giving an outline of how the Congress’ campaign would be during the polls, Mr. Kharge announced 10 promises under two guarantees of ‘Shramik Nyay’ and ‘Hissedari Nyay’. These include a constitutional amendment to raise the 50% cap on reservation for Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBC), and national minimum wage of ₹400 per day, which will also be the minimum for all Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) workers nationally.

Meanwhile, Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera said the 2024 General Election will be a milestone election because it will decide whether Indian democracy will be protected or not. “We have been raising issues that matter to farmers, youths and women, especially to the unemployed youth through the two yatras that Rahul Gandhi undertook. We have underlined the need for India’s politics to focus on these issues. People have been waiting for this election,” Mr. Khera said.

AAP chief and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said the election is a great festival of democracy and appealed to voters to vote this time “against dictatorship and hooliganism”. “The AAP works for the real issues of the people and facilitates them. Strengthen our hands by voting on ‘jhaadu‘ (broom, the AAP’s election symbol) wherever our candidates are contesting the polls, so that we can work for you with more energy,” Mr. Kejriwal said.

Communist Party of India (CPI) general secretary D. Raja said the primary objective of his party was to defeat the BJP and increase the presence of the Left parties in Parliament. “Removing the BJP is in the interest of the future of this country,” he said, adding that the CPI had to prepare itself to contest a reasonable number of seats.