‘Bihar ki beti’ to be Oppn’s candidate for Prez vs Kovind

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, June 22

A larger Opposition minus the Janata Dal (United) today unanimously nominated former Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar, 72, as its joint candidate for the July 17 presidential election.

Announcing her name, Congress president Sonia Gandhi, who chaired the meeting of 17 non-NDA parties in the Parliament House Complex, appealed to all parties to support her. 

EDIT: Opposition for Meira Kumar

Barring the Nitish Kumar led-JD (U), which abandoned Opposition ranks yesterday to support the ruling NDA’s nominee Ram Nath Kovind, all others who attended the first meeting on the issue came today. RLD’s Ajit Singh was an addition to the list.

The meeting lasted 40 minutes and quickly decided in favour of Meira Kumar, who emerged way ahead of other Dalit contenders — former minister Sushil Kumar Shinde and former Rajya Sabha MP Bhalchandra Mungekar — proposed in the gathering. The name of BR Ambedkar’s nephew, Prakash Ambedkar, was mentioned later by the CPM but wasn’t part of those proposed among the main probables.

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Insiders said Gandhi handed the floor to NCP chief Sharad Pawar after her opening statement. Describing Pawar as the “seniormost leader present”, she requested him to propose the three nominees out of which Kumar was unanimously chosen. 

“Ms Meira Kumar has fine personal and family credentials. She is the daughter of Babu Jagjivan Ram, a great freedom fighter and former Deputy PM. She was an IFS officer who quit to join politics. Meiraji was first elected to the Lok Sabha in 1985 and later to the 11th, 12th, 14th and 15th Houses. She was minister for social justice and water resources in the UPA government and the first woman Speaker of Lok Sabha,” Congress’ Ghulam Nabi Azad said after the decision. 

The meeting didn’t discuss Nitish Kumar’s desertion but Gandhi did say later, “I am not upset with anyone but I appeal to everyone to support Meira Kumar.”

The Opposition’s calculations favoured Kumar for obvious reasons. Her’s was the tallest stature. Most handy was her Bihar origin which, many thought, would exert moral and psychological pressure on Bihar CM Nitish Kumar and might break JD (U) ranks.

RJD chief Lalu Yadav clearly played the “Bihar ki beti” card when he said, “We have fielded Bihar’s daughter to contest fascist forces. 

I will urge Nitish Kumar to reconsider his wrong decision of backing the NDA candidate. A meeting of select JD (U) leaders was held yesterday and a wrong decision was taken.”

Lalu ruled out any danger to the ruling JD (U)-Congress-RJD alliance in Bihar after Nitish Kumar’s decision to support Kovind but said he would have personally “never voted with the BJP even if the Congress had asked him to”. Asked if Nitish Kumar had betrayed the Opposition, Lalu said, “That’s for him to answer.”

On Meira Kumar, everyone from BSP’s Mayawati, TMC’s Mamata Banerjee and SP’s Mulayam Singh are on board. BSP’s Satish Mishra said, “Mayawatiji had said she would support a Dalit candidate from the Opposition if that candidate is better and more capable than the NDA’s nominee. Mayawatiji has also signed Ms Kumar’s papers.”

CPM’s Sitaram Yechury also spoke of unanimity on Kumar, adding that the Left’s original choice Gopalkrishna Gandhi had opted out of the race after BJP named Ram Nath Kovind, a Dalit.

Non-NDA parties that attended today’s meeting were Congress (represented by Gandhi, former PM Manmohan Singh, AK Antony, Azad, Mallikarjun Kharge and Ahmed Patel), TMC (Derek O’ Brien), NCP (Sharad Pawar, Praful Patel and Tariq Anwar), SP (Naresh Agarwal and Ramgopal Yadav), RJD (Lalu Yadav), BSP (Satish Mishra), RLD (Ajit Singh), NC (Omar Abdullah), CPM (Yechury), CPI (D Raja), RSP (NK Premchandaran), IUML, AIUDF, Kerala Congress, JMM (Hemant Soren), DMK (Kanimozhi) and JDS (Danish Ali).