New Delhi, May 13 (Inditop) Political parties opposed to the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will meet here May 18 to decide their future course of action, Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) general secretary Prakash Karat said Wednesday.
Karat told reporters here that the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) will also join the meeting of the Third Front.
“We had consultations (Wednesday) and leaders of the AIADMK, Telugu Desam Party (TDP), Biju Janata Dal (BJD), Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) and the Left parties have decided that after the results come out on May 16, we will meet in New Delhi on May 18 to discuss the future course of action. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) will also join this discussion,” Karat said.
He said the non-Congress, non-BJP parties would “explore all the avenues” to form “an alternative secular government”.
The CPI-M politburo will also meet Monday, a day after the four Left parties hold discussions, he added. The Central Committee of the CPI-M will meet the next day.
Asked about the BJP’s reported attempts to woo N. Chandrababu Naidu of the TDP, the CPI-M leader said Naidu was one of the main leaders of the non-Congress, non-BJP combine. “Naidu has asked me to make this announcement,” Karat said.
But the BJP has managed to take the Telengana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) out of the Third Front and into its National Democratic Alliance (NDA). “TRS is not in this. Obviously not. They found some other place,” Karat said.
Asked about Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) leader H.D. Kumaraswamy’s meeting with Congress president Sonia Gandhi late Tuesday and speculation that his party too might quit the Third Front, Karat said JD-S chief H.D. Deve Gowda had cleared his party’s position.
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