Going into the Lok Sabha elections, it is not just the Aam Aadmi party that will contest on the anti-corruption plank. Activist Anna Hazare is all set to announce his support to the All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) formally on Wednesday, February 19, in New Delhi. The move is likely to target the same set of voters that AAP is depending on to support its national ambitions.
Hazare will announce his support at a joint press conference with TMC chief and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on February 19, sources have told India Today. While Hazare is in talks with Banerjee to announce his support to her candidacy as prime minister, the TMC will announce its plans to go national and fight the Lok Sabha elections from the same platform.
The party is expected to field candidates in several states outside West Bengal. In the last few years, it has fielded candidates in the North East, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the assembly elections.
Hazare and Banerjee have been in talks since last week and are scheduled to meet in New Delhi on Tuesday before announcing the formal tie-up. The anti-graft activist had praised Banerjee for her simplicity at Ralegan Sidhhi after a meeting with TMC leader Mukul Roy there earlier this month.
Hazare had sent a 17-point charter to various political parties but got a favourable response only from the TMC. The party ended the over three decade old rule of the Left in West Bengal riding on a anti-incumbency wave created after the Nandigram violence and fanned by popular support of the middle class. Hazare's movement too seemed to generate immense interest in the middle class.
The TMC hopes to find synergy between the supporters of the two campaigns with Hazare's support. The anti-corruption platform saw Arvind Kejriwal's AAP ride to power in Delhi and is expected to affect Lok Sabha elections which are barely eight to ten weeks away.
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