Mamta Banerjee, Naidu, KCR for HDK oath taking: Trailer for the 2019 Gathbandhan?
Bengaluru/New Delhi: The big guns are coming! In a massive show of opposition unity that seeks to present the vanguard of the non-BJP leaders from across the country and the contours of the emerging partnership of 2019, a slew of top opposition leaders have confirmed their presence at the swearing in of Karnataka's 25th chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy.
Apart from the Congress president Rahul Gandhi and a battery of other party leaders, there will probably be five chief ministers on the steps of the historic Vidhana Soudha when H D Kumaraswamy is sworn in as the head of the new JD(S)-Congress coalition government of Karnataka on May 23.
A veritable Who's Who of the political class will be present. The prominent personalities who have confirmed their participation in Mr. Kumaraswamy's oath taking ceremony on Wednesday apart from Mr. Gandhi and former Congress president Sonia Gandhi will be the Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, BSP chief Mayawati, West Bengal CM Mamta Banerjee, Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, former UP CM Akhilesh Yadav, RJD's Tejashwi Yadav (son of Lalu Prasad Yadav), AP CM Chandrababu Naidu, Telangana CM K Chandrashekar Rao and son K T Ram Rao, founder of Rashtriya Lok Dal Ajit Singh (former Union Minister), actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan and DMK chief M.K. Stalin.
The Janata Dal(S) is a partner of the ruling CPI(M)-led LDF in Kerala. The party's nominee, Mathew P Thomas, is the water resources minister in the state cabinet.
Ahead of the swearing-in, Mr. Kumaraswamy met BSP chief Mayawati in New Delhi and discussed the role of regional parties in the run up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Sources in the BSP said the two leaders also discussed the shape of the Congress-JD(S) cabinet and the possibility of sole BSP MLA N Mahesh getting a berth. The BSP and the JD(S) have a pre-poll alliance in the state.
During their over half-an-hour meeting, Mr Kumaraswamy who invited Ms Mayawati for the oath taking ceremony of the new council of ministers, discussed the role regional parties could play to stop the BJP from returning to power in the next Lok Sabha polls.
