Opposition unity bid: Nitish meets Naveen, but 'no talks on alliance'

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Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, currently busy meeting Opposition leaders to unify for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, called on his Odisha counterpart Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar On Tuesday.

Patnaik stressed that he didn’t discuss politics with Kumar, his former ministerial colleague, but their old ties, including their time together in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee cabinet.

After their hour-long luncheon meeting, Patnaik said: “No discussion was held on any alliance today. I am delighted that Nitish ji came to Bhubaneswar. We are old friends and colleagues ever since we served in Atal Bihari Vajpayee cabinet.”

That Patnaik will stay “equidistant” from both the BJP and Congress was conveyed to his Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee as well when she called on the Odisha CM on March 23, days after a meeting with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav in Kolkata.

Kumar spoke of his “old relationship” with Patnaik and his legendary father Biju Patnaik. “We did not hold any political discussion. We have good relations, and there is no need to discuss politics,” Kumar, scheduled to meet Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar later this week, said. There is also an Opposition leaders’ meeting in the works.

It is unlikely Patnaik would attend any meeting that might require sharing the stage with the Congress. A BJD source said Patnaik considers the Congress, not the BJP, his party’s principal rival in the state. “The Congress can match the BJD as it has a pan-Odisha footprint while the BJP is struggling to expand beyond the 63 of the 126 assemblies and nine of the 21 Lok Sabha seats it contested as part of its alliance with the BJD,” he said. Moreover, a triangular fight is to the BJD’s advantage.

Incidentally, the BJP leadership of the 1990s played a vital role in the emergence of Patnaik, Kumar and Banerjee, in their respective states and on the national political scene. In 1998, Patnaik and Kumar debuted in the Union cabinet, inducted into the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led council of ministers. Banerjee was part of Vajpayee’s Cabinet, along with Patnaik and Kumar, after the 1999 Lok Sabha polls. Kumar-led Janata Dal (United) has flirted with both the BJP and Congress since 2015, Patnaik’s Biju Janata Dal (BJD) severed ties with the saffron party in the aftermath of the Kandhamal riots in 2008 after a decade-long alliance. 

But, the BJD has also displayed its soft spot for its former ally by supporting key legislations in Parliament, including triple talaq and turning Jammu and Kashmir into a Union Territory. The BJD assisted Railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw in getting elected to the Rajya Sabha in June 2019 unopposed after PM Narendra Modi called Patnaik. In July 2022, Modi consulted Patnaik before the BJP announced Droupadi Murmu, who hails from Odisha, as its presidential candidate. Patnaik campaigned for Murmu’s election, reaching out to the Odisha Congress to support her candidature.

“Patnaik always does whatever is in his interest. If he thinks joining the third front might help him, he would. If he thinks it won't help him, he will not join,” Odisha BJP General Secretary Prithviraj Harichandan said, stressing that the Patnaik-Kumar meeting had no ramifications for the BJP. BJD legislator Soumya Ranjan Patnaik said: “Kumar wants a reformative and alternative front in the country. He may discuss the matter with Patnaik. But the CM has already cleared that the BJD will maintain equidistance from both the Congress and the BJP.”

But Patnaik is known to play luncheon diplomacy, including when  he hosted L K Advani, Pranab Mukherjee, H D Deve Gowda, and Sitaram Yechury for lunch in January 2018, sharing pictures on social media which went viral spawning political speculation. The occasion was the release of a book on Biju Patnaik.