INDIA bloc will unitedly fight and defeat BJP in 2024 Lok Sabha polls: Shivpal Yadav

Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav on Sunday expressed confidence that the INDIA bloc will defeat the BJP in the 2024 general elections.

About seat sharing in the alliance, he told reporters that there is still time to decide the distribution of seats and talks will be held on the issue.

"The INDIA alliance will unitedly accomplish the task of removing BJP from the country," Yadav claimed.

The SP leader's remarks come ahead of the December 19 meeting of the opposition bloc in Delhi where seat sharing and other issues will be discussed.

To a question about the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) joining the alliance, he said that the BSP leadership should first distance themselves from the BJP and not work "as a B-team" of the ruling party.

Asked about who will be the prime ministerial candidate of the INDIA bloc, he said that the alliance has several faces. "We still have time. It will not be an issue," he added.

The SP national general secretary said that he has come to visit Muzaffarnagar and Saharanpur to strengthen the party.

To a query on the SP leaders expressing unhappiness with the Congress' attitude in the recent assembly polls, Yadav evaded a direct reply and said the INDIA alliance is mainly for the 2024 general elections.

Evolving a "core positive agenda", seat sharing and a programme to hold joint rallies are among the main challenges before the opposition I.N.D.I.A bloc that will be taken up at its next meeting in the national capital on December 19, according to Congress sources.

The parties intend to move forward with the unity theme - 'Main Nahin, Hum' (We, Not Me) - as a counter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the meeting, the sources said.

The meeting is being held in the backdrop of the Congress' poor show in the just concluded Assembly elections, where it suffered humiliating defeats in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh.