Congress president Rahul Gandhi and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi will attend the swearing-in ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, according to reports.
The swearing-in-ceremony of Modi and his Council of Ministers is scheduled to take place at 7 pm on Thursday at Rashtrapati Bhawan.
This decision comes even as the uncertainty in Congress over the resignation of Rahul Gandhi as party chief after the Lok Sabha poll debacle continues.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Wednesday that she will not attend the oath-taking ceremony, after rejecting the BJP’s claim that scores of saffron party workers were killed in violence perpetrated by her TMC.
The TMC supremo’s announcement came in apparent remonstrance after the families of over 40 BJP workers allegedly slain by her party were taken by train to New Delhi to attend the swearing-in ceremony.
Banerjee had on Tuesday received an invitation and told reporters she would attend the event as a matter of “constitutional courtesy” after having spoken to a couple of chief ministers of other states.
However, after it transpired that family members of over 40 BJP workers, who were killed in political violence in West Bengal in the last one year, have also been invited, a livid Banerjee said she will not attend as the “occasion to celebrate democracy should not be devalued to score political points”.
Leaders of all BIMSTEC countries have also confirmed their participation in the ceremony. Kyrgyz President Jeenbekov, the current chair of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and Mauritius PM Jugnauth have also been invited for Modi’s swearing-in.
(With PTI inputs)