Karnataka Deputy CM and Congress strongman DK Shivakumar on Friday made a big prediction about the electoral fortunes of the Congress-led INDIA bloc as well as the the BJP-led NDA alliance in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.
DK Shivakumar said that the INDIA bloc is winning around 300 seats whereas the NDA alliance will get almost 200 seats. Shivakumar added that the INDIA alliance believes in collective leadership. He further said that the INDIA alliance will win the elections and will come together to form the government.
"INDIA alliance is winning almost 300 seats and NDA will get around 200. We believe in collective leadership... We will win the elections and will come together to discuss and form the government and have a leadership," Shivakumar was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.
To explain his point further, the Karnataka Deputy CM remembered how Dr Manmohan Singh was chosen to be India's Prime Minister when the UPA came into power for the first time in 2004. He said that while all the MPs at the time wanted Sonia Gandhi to be PM, she decided otherwise.
"Earlier also, when the UPA came, you are in a collective leadership. The entire Parliament members of the country, decided Sonia Gandhi should be the Prime Minister of this country. They all gave a letter to Abdul Kalamji, who was a minority as a President, my President," Shivakumar recounted.
He said that Sonia Gandhi met the then President of India and decided that Dr Singh, an economist by education, should become the Prime Minister of India to save the country.
"Then Sonia Gandhi decided that in the better of the country, an economy should be the Prime Minister of the country. So she, being a minority woman, married to a Hindu family, asked for invitation by President of India. Then she gave to a Sikh man, a minority, an economist to save this country."
Meanwhile, West Bengal CM and Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Mamata Banerjee said her party will support the INDIA bloc if they manage to form the government at the Centre. "We will provide leadership to the INDI alliance and help them in every way from outside," she said.
The results of the ongoing Lok Sabha elections will be declared on June 4.