Sending out a robust sign that each one is nicely between the Trinamool Congress and the INDIA alliance following the pre-election acrimony, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is able to marketing campaign for Congress chief Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who is about to make her electoral debut from Wayanad, celebration sources have stated.

The Trinamool Congress sources stated that not solely is Ms Banerjee prepared to marketing campaign for Ms Gandhi, however she had additionally steered throughout an INDIA alliance assembly final December that the Congress chief ought to contest towards PM Narendra Modi from Varanasi – an concept that has additionally been floated inside the Congress as early as 2019. 

Ms Gandhi will likely be combating from Wayanad when a bypoll is held there, after Rahul Gandhi determined to vacate the seat and retain the household bastion of Raebareli. He had gained the Wayanad constituency for the second time, by a margin of three.6 lakh votes, within the just-concluded elections. 

A part of the explanation behind the rekindled bonhomie between Ms Banerjee and the Congress is the truth that Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, one of many Bengal chief minister’s strongest critics, has misplaced from the Baharampur Lok Sabha constituency in these elections after 5 straight victories. 

Whereas Ms Banerjee and the Gandhis are recognized to share an in depth bond, Mr Chowdhury’s acerbic and sometimes private barbs on the chief minister have been a supply of friction between the Trinamool and the Congress. They had been additionally seen as an element behind her choice to go it alone in West Bengal within the Lok Sabha elections – a transfer that paid off, with the Trinamool keeping off an all-out problem by the BJP and successful 29 of the state’s 42 constituencies. 

The sources stated the “Adhir problem” has now been resolved and that the Trinamool had instructed the Congress that he would lose his seat. 

Enhanced Coordination 

Forward of the Parliament session beginning on Monday, which can see the opposition at its strongest since 2014, the sources stated the Bengal Chief Minister has additionally sought higher coordination amongst members of the INDIA alliance, who’ve gained 232 Lok Sabha seats between them. 

Indicators of this taking place have already begun, with the Trinamool, the Congress and the DMK opposing the implementation of the three new prison legal guidelines – Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, which can change the Indian Penal Code, the Code of Felony Process and the Indian Proof Act, respectively. 

The opposition has claimed that the legal guidelines had been handed with out session throughout the Monsoon session of Parliament final yr, when over 140 MPs had been suspended. In a letter to the Prime Minister on Friday, Ms Banerjee pushed for a recent evaluate of the legal guidelines by Parliament.

“The outgoing authorities of yours had handed these three crucial payments unilaterally, and with completely no debate. That day, virtually 100 members of the Lok Sabha had been suspended and a complete 146 MPs of the each Homes had been thrown out of Parliament,” Ms Banerjee wrote, including that the three payments had been handed in an “authoritarian method” in a “darkish hour of democracy”. 

Chandigarh MP and senior Congress chief Manish Tewari has additionally hit out on the authorities over the implementation of the legal guidelines. 

“The brand new prison legal guidelines that come into impact from July 1st 2024 lay the foundations of turning India right into a Police State. Their implementation have to be stopped forthwith and Parliament should re-examine them,” he posted on X.

One other problem that the opposition is prone to try to nook the federal government over is the NEET and NET examination fiasco. Protests have erupted throughout the nation over irregularities in NEET and the cancellation of the UGC-NET, each of that are carried out by the Nationwide Testing Company.