Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today said that she has proposed Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge's name for the PM position. If Kharge were to be made the PM candidate, a Dalit PM aspirant would be in the fray for the first time in the history of India. Kharge, on his part, is said to have told Banerjee, Arvind Kejriwal and others that who should lead the country must be ideally decided after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
There is a view that the Congress, TMC, SP and AAP are planning to checkmate the BJP by supporting a Dalit PM candidate so that Narendra Modi won't dare to make remarks against him. Mocking Rahul Gandhi has always been a best-selling idea for the BJP. However, it won't be easy to mock a Dalit candidate.
However, others disagree. "If and when Mr Kharge’s name is announced formally as PM candidate, he is fair game regardless of caste. No one spared Modi, slurs came his way in 2014 and 2019. Mayawati, Mulayam, Lalu Yadav have all battled casteist remarks in the heat of the electoral battle," wrote senior journalist Smita Prakash. Modi is an OBC, by the way.
