Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao and his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee on Monday said they have made “a good beginning” regarding the formation of a Third Front ahead of the 2019 General Elections. They met in Kolkata on Monday.

“I think politics is a continuous process,” Banerjee said after the meeting, according to ANI. “Whatever we have discussed is aimed towards [the] development of the country. Politics throws at you situations where you have to work with different people. I believe in politics.”

Rao said the Third Front will be for the people. “This won’t be a mere alliance of a few political parties, this will be for the people. There is a need for an alternative force,” he said.

Earlier in March, political leaders such as Banerjee, former Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen leader Asaduddin Owaisi backed Rao’s proposal for a Third Front – one without the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and its main opposition, the Congress. Rao’s office had said he was working on a plan to conduct a series of meetings with interested organisations and individuals across India.

When asked what the Front would do if the Congress decides to support it, Rao claimed the coalition would be “different from the routine political model” and will be based on the people’s agenda. “Our agenda is development. It is not about the BJP or other party, it is about the people,” Rao said, according to NDTV. “For the last 71 years what has been happening in the country. Do you want the same thing to continue? The country needs a miracle, this country needs to change, reinvent.”

For the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, more than 10 parties had floated a Third Front, but they did not do well. The Front included the Left parties, Samajwadi Party, Janata Dal (United) and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.