K Chandrashekhar Rao-Mamata Banerjee meeting in Kolkata: focus of talks on non-BJP, non-Congress front ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha polls

Telengana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao arrived in Kolkata on Monday morning to call on West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee. They had a meeting on Monday evening.

Rao, the Telengana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) chief, has been meeting non-Congress non-BJP leaders to form a federal front ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The BJP, TRS and the Congress fought the elections separately in the recent Assembly elections in Telengana, and the TRS had a massive win with two-thirds majority and formed the government. This win has further fuelled Rao’s ambition to see himself as a powerful leader nationally, in 2019.

Rao had met Odisha chief minister and BJD chief Naveen Patnaik yesterday. The Telengana CM has said that there was need for the regional parties to unite and to provide an alternative to the Congress and the BJP for the general elections ahead. “We believe there has to be an alternative to the Congress and the BJP,” he said.

However, the Odisha CM hasn’t yet made any comment on whether he would be part of this federal front.

The Bengal chief minister too hasn’t disclosed her strategies yet. She has in fact been meeting regional party leaders herself and trying to bring them together as a powerful alternative to the BJP before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. In fact, she has been one of the most vocal leaders when it comes to attacking the ruling BJP government’s policies and politics.

Banerjee has been preparing for a massive rally of the Opposition leaders in Kolkata on January 19. She has met a number of leaders for the past few months, including N Chandrababu Naidu, Arvind Kejriwal, Sharad Pawar, National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah (the latter called on her in Kolkata on Friday), and discussed with them possibilities of forming a federal alliance.

Earlier this month, leaders of 21 Opposition parties met in Delhi and agreed to work together to defeat the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The meeting, called by Andhra Pradesh chief minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief N Chandrababu Naidu, had among others, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Congress president Rahul Gandhi, former Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and HD Deve Gowda, Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Sitaram Yechury.

Rao had called on Banerjee in March this year and discussed the possibilities of a non-BJP, non-Congress front at that time as well.