Express News Service
NEW DELHI: The friction between the Congress and TMC over poaching by the later may impact the opposition unity during the winter session of Parliament with the Mamata Banerjee-led party looking to play a bigger role in attacking the Centre in terms of floor coordination with other parties.
The first instance of a possible breach in the opposition unity was visible at the Congress’ call to boycott the Constitutional Day event at the Parliament House Friday.
The Congress said the 14 opposition parties boycotted the event after Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge reached out to them on Thursday but the TMC took a different stand and skipped the function as none of the party MPs were in Delhi.
“This is our official stand but why should we let Congress take the credit? It is going out to the town saying that it was on its call that the opposition decided to boycott the event,” said a senior TMC MP, adding, the party is for the opposition unity to take on the Centre but won’t follow the Congress floor strategy.
When asked to comment, Congress party deputy leader in Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma said that the party believes in the opposition unity and taking everyone along.
In Rajya Sabha, Congress is the largest opposition party with 34 MPs while TMC having 13 MPs is the second largest. Some of the opposition leaders feel that the differences between the two parties could play out during the session with TMC going all out to take on the Centre over issues related to farmers, inflation and others.
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“There are visible differences between the two parties and it could also play out in the House but we will have to wait and see how things roll out during the session. In the past, the TMC has skipped a few joint opposition meetings called by the Congress in Parliament,” said a Left party MP in Rajya Sabha.
A senior opposition MP pointed out that during the monsoon session, TMC wanted to make the Pegasus spyware row as the prime issue and it pushed hard for they were high after winning Bengal elections, and didn’t let the House function while several smaller opposition parties wanted the Parliament to get into business.
During the Congress Parliamentary Party strategy meeting chaired by party chief Sonia Gandhi on Thursday, Kharge, Sharma and Congress chief whip in Rajya Sabha Jairam Ramesh were asked to coordinate with the opposition parties for unity.
Sharma enjoys good rapport with Mamata as both have worked together in the Congress during the 1980s when Sharma was Youth Congress president and Mamata was general secretary. During her visit to the national capital in July, she has even invited Sharma for a meeting.
The TMC and Congress have been engaged in a war of words over some Congress leaders joining the Trinamool. What has come as a big blow is that the Congress legislature party leader in Meghalaya Mukul Sangma joined TMC along with 12 party MLAs, making it the principal opposition party in the state.
