With the aim to give a boost to non-BJP, non-Congress alliance for the Lok Sabha polls, the leaders of the gathbandhan in Uttar Pradesh comprising SP, BSP and RLD are likely to participate in the opposition rally called by Trinamool Congress president and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata on January 19.
Samajwadi Party spokesman Rajendra Choudhary said that party president Akhilesh Yadav along with party’s vice-president Kironmoy Nanda would attend the opposition rally to be held at Brigade ground in Kolkata on Saturday.
“Akhilesh Yadav will leave for Kolkata on Friday on a two-day visit. He will meet local leaders and the next day he will participate in the rally,” Choudhary said in a statement issued here on Thursday.
There are reports that Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati could also attend the opposition unity rally along with Rashtriya Lok Dal president Ajit Singh. But if they do not attend the TMC rally, their representatives, Satish Chandra Mishra of BSP and Jayant Choudhury of RLD would go to Kolkata.
Mamata Banerjee has declared that through the Brigade rally she will showcase pan-India opposition unity in the run up to the Lok Sabha polls. Leaders of non-BJP parties from “Kashmir to Kanyakumari” would be present at the rally, which, she claimed, would be the biggest public meeting in the eastern region in the last four decades.
