Yashwant Sinha picked as joint Opposition candidate for presidential polls

By PTI

NEW DELHI: Former Union minister Yashwant Sinha’s name has emerged as the consensus presidential candidate of 13 opposition parties, including the Congress, the TMC and the Samajwadi Party, which met here on Tuesday to discuss the issue.

Opposition leaders, who gathered at the Parliament annexe for the meeting convened by NCP chief Sharad Pawar to decide on a consensus candidate for the presidential election, agreed on Sinha’s name, they said.

Sinha’s name came up after Pawar, Gopalkrishna Gandhi and Farooq Abdullah opted out of the race.

The parties that attended the meeting include the Congress, NCP, TMC, CPI, CPI-M, Samajwadi Party, National Conference, AIMIM, RJD and AIUDF.

We (opposition parties) have unanimously decided that Yashwant Sinha will be the common candidate of the Opposition for the Presidential elections: Congress leader Jairam Ramesh pic.twitter.com/lhnfE7Vj8d
— ANI (@ANI) June 21, 2022
Congress’ Mallikarjun Kharge and Jairam Ramesh, TMC’s Abhishek Banerjee, DMK’s Tiruchi Siva, CPI-M’s Sitaram Yechury and CPI’s D Raja were among those who participated in the meeting.

Five regional parties considered non-aligned – TRS, BJD, AAP, SAD and YSRCP — stayed away.

These parties had also stayed away from the June 15 meeting convened by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

Earlier today, Yashwant Sinha had said that he will “step aside” from the TMC to work for the larger national cause of Opposition unity. “I am grateful to Mamataji for the honour and prestige she bestowed on me in the TMC. Now a time has come when for a larger national cause I must step aside from the party to work for greater opposition unity. I am sure she approves of the step,” Sinha said in a tweet.