9 opposition parties meet in Bhubaneswar, vow to defeat BJD and BJP in 2024 polls

BHUBANESWAR: A couple of days after 26 opposition political parties met at a hotel in Bengaluru to take on the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a similar provincial-level exercise was done in Bhubaneswar. Nine opposition parties, including the Congress, CPI, CPI (M), Samajwadi Party, Trinamool Congress and Aam Aadmi Party, met here and announced to fight against the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha and assembly elections in the state.

The meeting held under the chairmanship of the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) president Sarat Pattanayak saw attendance by top leaders of all the attending political parties.

The 2024 general election will be a make-or-break battle for the major political parties, especially the Congress which has been out of power in the state since 2000. Its vote share in the 2019 Odisha Assembly polls dropped to 16.12 per cent from 33.78 in 2000 when it lost power to the BJD-BJP alliance.

“The ruling BJD had promised employment to two crore youths and keep the prices of essential commodities under control. But they couldn’t fulfil any of their promises. The BJP and the BJD, though they are posing themselves as political rivals after they separated in 2009, they are in fact, siblings. They have pushed the state into the abyss of backwardness. All the like-minded parties which took part in the meeting today have vowed to defeat them in the coming 2024 polls,” said the OPCC chief Sarat Pattanayak.

CPI (M) leader Janardan Pati said, “We would like to request the people of the state to unite against the BJD and BJP. The nine parties that have assembled in the first phase will bring other parties together in the first week of August. We solicit the blessings and cooperation of the people of the state.”

Echoing the same, Samajwadi Party leader Rabi Behera said, “The farmers’ income has not doubled, nor has the paddy MSP (minimum support price) been raised to Rs 2930 per quintal as demanded by us. Opposing this, the anti-BJP and BJD parties would hold a mass convention in the first week of August. Later it would be intensified into a mass agitation against the BJD and the BJP.”

Among others, the meeting was attended by the OPCC campaign committee chairman Bijay Patnaik and CPI leader Abhaya Sahoo.