Cong MP Manickam Tagore urges party to declare its PM face, pitches for Rahul Gandhi

New Delhi, May 24 (PTI) Amid ongoing efforts to unite the Opposition ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Congress MP Manickam Tagore on Tuesday urged the party to declare its prime ministerial face.

He also pitched for Congress leader Rahul Gandhi as the Opposition’s candidate for the post of prime minister.

Gandhi was disqualified as a member of Lok Sabha in March after he was convicted and sentenced to two years in jail by a Surat court in a 2019 criminal defamation case over his “Modi surname” remarks.

On Twitter, Tagore, who is the whip of the Congress in Lok Sabha, shared a chart of a survey by a media group that claimed Gandhi had 27 per cent support while Prime Minister Narendra Modi had 43 per cent support for the top post.

“Hope my colleagues in @INCIndia will accept that without our announcement or projection 27 per cent of people want our leader as PM candidate. Let’s announce it then see the support,” he tweeted.

Tagore said,”We have to be clear that we have a PM candidate and we must announce our PM candidate.”

Bihar Chief Minister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar and NCP chief Sharad Pawar have said they are not in the race to become the prime minister and asserted that their only interest is in uniting the Opposition.

Both Kumar and Pawar have made efforts in bringing together Opposition parties and asked like-minded parties to come up unitedly to take on the BJP in 2024 general elections.