Leaders of 13 parties attend Rahul Gandhi’s breakfast meeting; AAP, BSP stay away

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, August 3

Leaders of thirteen like-minded non-BJP parties were attending the breakfast meeting hosted by former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi at the Constitution Club here today to forge a joint opposition strategy in the face of parliamentary disruptions over the issue of debate on Pegasus spyware matter.

AAP and BSP were not present at the meeting which was attended by all MPs of the Congress and representatives of 13 opposition parties — NCP, Shiv Sena, RJD, SP, CPIM, CPI, IUML, RSP, KCM, JMM, NC, TMC and DMK.

The Trinamool Congress was represented by Kalyan Banerjee and Mahua Moitra.

Supriya Sule, Praful Patel of NCP, Priyanka Chaturvedi and Sanjay Raut of Shiv Sena, Ram Gopal Yadav of SP, Manoj Jha of RJD are attending among other leaders.

The opposition is discussing the strategy for the remaining monsoon session which ends on August 13.

Today is the 12th day of the session with 11 already wasted.

The session has 19 sittings.

The opposition is adamant on a debate on the Pegasus issue but the government has said the government can take clarifications on IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw’s statement rejecting Pegasus spying charges.

The opposition meeting came parallel to the BJP parliamentary party meeting being chaired by prime minister Narendra Modi at the Parliament House complex.