A group of Congress leaders have joined hands with members of the intelligentsia in launching a secular forum that seeks to act as a bridge between like-minded parties to put up a united front against the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.

The group recently met CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury in Delhi and plans to meet CPI secretary D. Raja and leaders of other secular parties in the coming weeks to cement their ties based on the sole objective of denying a third successive term to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP.

The Secular Forum’s convener, Congressman Praveen Davar, told The Telegraph on Friday in Bangalore that the meeting with Yechury was “a very encouraging start to the cause of forging a secular alliance against the BJP”.

The other members are parliamentarians Shashi Tharoor of the Congress and Jawhar Sircar of the Trinamul Congress, former Union ministers Mani Shankar Iyer and Salman Khurshid, retired bureaucrat Wajahat Habibullah, activist and former journalist John Dayal, and academic and scholar Apoorvanand.

“The idea is to have a one-to-one contest with the BJP so that secular votes do not get divided. We are trying to convince all secular parties to accept the idea and we are sure of success as we head towards the Lok Sabha polls,” Davar said.

“The forum will be a bridge between all secular parties and it is a political initiative even though it has Wajahat and Apoorvanand, who are not part of any political party,” he noted.

Seat distribution, according to Davar, could be worked out as the dialogue intensifies, although he personally felt the Congress should contest in about 350 Lok Sabha seats to cash in on the goodwill created by Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodi Yatra.

Asked about the challenges en route to realising the goal of a unity of secular parties, Davar said states like Kerala, Bengal, Tripura and Delhi would have issues to be sorted out.

“While the Congress and the CPM can have an alliance at the national level, it won’t be possible in Kerala, Bengal and Tripura where such atruck would give the advantage to the BJP. Likewise,the Aam Aadmi Party would have to be given a decent number of seats in Delhi. But these are problems that can be worked around once every participating secular party agrees to the common objective,” he said.

“We all must learn to overcome such challenges to ensure Modi doesn’t win a third term. This being the sole objective, our forum is trying to iron out all differences to ensure a total unity of secular parties ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. Once that is achieved, the same formula can be applied in all future elections including state polls that happenalmost every year,” Davar said.

He said the forum was trying to get all parties to appoint one leader each to liaise with it and address and settle all issues amicably. “We are considering a few more members for the forum to take the total to 11.”