Yashwant Sinha to launch ‘national forum’ across party lines

The forum will be launched on January 30 in Delhi, the 70th anniversary of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
It is clear that Sinha’s criticism of the government has found resonance in the membership of the forum. With 16 months or so left for general elections, the Manch hopes to raise the level of discussion of important national issues and provide a counterpoint to those offered by the government.

Equally, several of those signing up seem disenchanted with the state of affairs in their own political parties. Pavan Varma of the JD(U) was a critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policies till his party chief Nitish Kumar joined hands with him. Ashutosh of AAP, who left a career in journalism to join Arvind Kejriwal, has been hard put recently to justify the Rajya Sabha seats that AAP has given to three wealthy people — one of them who quit the Congress only a few days before joining AAP.

The Manch isn’t asking any of these politicians to quit the primary membership of their respective parties. It hopes to provide an umbrella for a meeting of minds, said its members. Any talk of forming a political party, they said, is out of the question.

The fact that it is being launched on the eve of the Budget session means that this will be the Manch’s first big salvo against the government. Given Sinha’s experience as a finance minister, he is expected to raise issues related to the state of the economy, such as the impact of demonetisation and GST, and whether the Prime Minister’s trip to Davos to attract FDI will yield concrete results.