Bhubaneswar: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who is on a four-day visit to New Delhi, is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi at 4.30 pm, official sources said on Thursday.
Refusing to attribute any political significance to the meeting, sources further said that Naveen is likely to seek the Centre’s cooperation in sanctioning more houses for Odisha under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, expediting implementation of some key railway and highway projects. He may apprise also apprise PM Modi about the recent Japan visit and talks with Nippon Steel on the mega Steel plant in Kendrapada district.
He flew to Delhi the previous day and likely to return to Odisha on May 13.
However, the timing of his visit, coming a day after he meet Bihar CM Nitish Kumar in Bhubaneswar, evoked a lot of curiosity in political circles. While Naveen-Nitish meeting was perceived as an attempt to tell Modi & Co that if they step up their bellicosity against his dispensation with an eye on the 2024 polls then he very well had the option to join hands with proponents of the Third Front, there was speculation that he might call on his Delhi counterpart and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal in what could further send signals that BJD is trying to play footsie with non-BJP parties interested to cobble an anti-NDA coalition.
Also Read: Is There A Message For Narendra Modi In Naveen Patnaik’s Meeting With Nitish Kumar?
A few days ago, Naveen met his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee at his residence at a time when BJP was firing salvoes at the BJD government over alleged lawlessness in the state.
This despite the fact that the ruling BJD, which has since 2009 been officially claiming to have maintained equidistance from both BJP and Congress, has avoided joining either the NDA or evolving a non-BJP alliance so far by skipping all meetings aimed at forging a Third Front.
The CM had last met PM Modi on May 30, 2022, a month before the presidential polls in New Delhi.
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