Congress Sidles Up To Kanhaiya

The popular student leader-turned-neta tempts the Congress to test a common-cause alliance with the Left

- Amitabh Srivastava

CPI youth leader Kanhaiya Kumar’s Jana Gana Mana rally in Patna’s Gandhi Maidan on February 27 had two unlikely people in attendance—Congress MLAs Shakeel Ahmad Khan and Awadhesh Singh shared the dais with him. Khan, a former Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students union president like Kanhaiya, insisted later that their presence there was only to support the cause—the rally was part of a campaign against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and the proposed-then-denied National Register of Citizens (NRC)—but he did admit the opposition needed every like-minded party and individual on board if it was to best the JD(U)-led NDA alliance in the assembly election this October.