INDIA bloc must name PM candidate: Uddhav

Mumbai: Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray and party MP Sanjay Raut, who attended the INDIA bloc's Delhi meeting virtually on Monday, told the alliance partners that the bloc must name a prime ministerial candidate before going to the people ahead of the Lok Sabha polls."People ask us who our PM face is... We must elect this face and tell the people that we have this person to lead the country." Uddhav said that the bloc must meet more often and there must be more dialogue among the allies. Uddhav also raised a question mark on the bloc's failure to appoint a coordinator or convenor since its formation. "A deserving person must be appointed as a coordinator or convenor who can be connected to all INDIA bloc partners," Thackeray said. Raut said a consensus was reached to launch a massive agitation—both inside and outside Parliament—aimed at forcing Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan to resign over the issue of NEET paper leak.NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule represented the party at the Delhi meeting. Prior to the meet, Sule told reporters in Delhi that the meet would deliberate on issues affecting the country, including inflation, gas prices, unemployment and the alleged irregularities in the NEET examination.Meanwhile, the BJP's chief spokesperson in Maharashtra Navnath Ban said that Thackeray's virtual attendance at the INDIA group's meeting is a clear indication that it is only for namesake. Ban said that Thackeray chose not to send Raut nor his son Aaditya Thackeray to attend the meeting. Taking a dig at the opposition after the INDIA bloc meeting, DCM and Shiva Sena chief Eknath Shinde said the disillusionment in the opposition camp is apparent as the alliance partners believe that they would be defeated, and that is why some people have distanced themselves from the Delhi meeting. Shinde said that the opposition coalition's morale has been crushed by a string of electoral setbacks.In Baramati, amid reports that the DMK is distancing itself from the INDIA alliance, NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar said that a meeting of functionaries of the opposition bloc would be convened soon to resolve differences.—with agency inputs