Congress to reach out to Oppn parties to corner Modi govt during Winter Session

Congress will reach out to all Opposition parties to corner the Narendra Modi government in Parliament during the Winter Session starting next Monday irrespective of what parties like Trinamool Congress do though it may not go ahead with a strategy to disrupt proceedings at the drop of the hat.

Sources said party president Sonia Gandhi wanted leaders to take all necessary steps for unity of Opposition parties inside Parliament and keep rising tension with parties like Trinamool Congress out of the House during the Session.

Sonia chaired a meeting of senior leaders, including Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge on Thursday evening, to evolve a strategy for the Winter Session and take steps to forge unity among Opposition parties.

Senior leader A K Antony, Congress General Secretary (Organisation) K C Venugopal, Rajya Sabha Congress Deputy Leader Anand Sharma, Rajya Congress Chief Whip Jairam Ramesh, Lok Sabha Chief Whip K Suresh and Lok Sabha Whip Manickam Tagore among others attended the meeting.

The meeting came a day after 12 of the 17 Congress MLAs in Meghalaya crossed over to Trinamool Congress whose party chief and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who was in Delhi not meeting Sonia as she used to do earlier. Trinamool has poached a number of Congress leaders in the past few months and the relation between the parties have been strained.

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In the meeting, sources said, Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury spoke against involving Trinamool Congress but Sonia told the leaders that they should keep the opposition to Trinamool outside Parliament.

Also, sources said, the party is not in favour of complete disruption of the proceedings and would adopt a strategy of "discussion and disruption only on inevitable situations".

Congress would demand that the bill to repeal farm laws along with a bill to provide legal backing on Minimum Support Price should be taken up on the first day of Session itself. On Monday, it will also demand the resignation of Minister of State for Hom Ajay Mishra, who is embroiled in a controversy over killings of farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri.

The party has decided to take up issues like price rise, Rs four lakh compensation for Covid-19 victims, Prime Minister's response on Pegasus, border row with China, terrorist attacks in Jammu and Kashmir in the following days.

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