The Janata Dal United (JDU) will not attend the grand finale of the Bharat Jodo Yatra, led by Rahul Gandhi, in Srinagar on January 30, which coincides with the martyrdom day of Mahatma Gandhi.

However, the JDU stressed that the country was being transformed from an “electoral democracy” to an “electoral autocracy” and requested the Congress to take necessary steps for Opposition unity.

JDU national president Rajiv Ranjan Singh aka Lalan Singh on Thursday wrote a letter to his Congress counterpart Mallikarjun Kharge in this regard, expressing his inability to attend the concluding event of the Yatra. Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar is already busy with his own Samadhan Yatra to take stock of the implementation of development and welfare schemes in the state and will not be able to participate either.

“Much as I would like to be present at the historic event, I regret my inability to do so, as I need to be present at the launch of the party’s election campaign at Wokha in Nagaland on the same day,” Singh wrote in the letter.

Pointing out that Bharat Jodo Yatra has provided an opportunity to study, experience and sense the mood and anxieties of the people first-hand, Singh wrote in the letter that he was sure it “will go a long way in helping us formulate joint strategies in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections”.

“My party sincerely feels that the need of the hour is a unified Opposition and expects that the Indian National Congress takes appropriate steps in this direction,” Singh wrote to Kharge.

The JDU national president also said that there were no two opinions that there was a decline in democratic values in the country and that the “Constitutional institutions supposed to ensure checks and balances on unrestrained executive power are being systematically destroyed. The pace at which the country is fast transforming itself from an electoral democracy to an electoral autocracy is frightening.”

The Congress has invited top leaders from the Opposition parties across the country to attend the concluding ceremony of the Yatra.

However, it will be interesting to see how many actually attend it or depute their representatives as it could also be taken as a signal of their willingness to come under the Congress umbrella and accept Rahul as the prime ministerial candidate.

Though Kumar has asserted that he was not a contender for the Prime Minister’s post, his JDU has often projected him as a suitable candidate.

In fact, he had taken a lead in making efforts for a broad-based unity among the Opposition at the national level.