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Mulayam warns CPI-M over supporting Congress

Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav today virtually warned the Communist Party of India-Marxist against the Congress and said it would be difficult for left parties to lend any overt or covert support to the Congress which ''backed'' anti-people bills brought by the BJP during its 13-month rule at the Centre.

Talking to newsmen after the two-day national executive committee meeting of the SP, Yadav visualised that the third front would be in shape before the Lok Sabha general elections due in September-October this year, but wondered how the left parties, particularly the CPI-M, could decide its poll alliances on a state-to-state basis.

In reply to a specific question about his advice to left parties to make a third front a strong alternative, Yadav quipped, ''I am not in a position to advise them''. It is up to the left parties to decide their political course and they have to choose the right side, he said.

Yadav made it clear that the third front means political parties representing the downtrodden, poor farmers, humiliated and ignored social sections, minorities and other oppressed classes.

The SP leader reminded left parties that the Congress had compromised with the BJP on major issues like patent and insurance sector regulatory bills which are going to let loose economic anarchy on poor sections.

He, however, hoped that the Congress bandwagon would sink midway, indicating the left parties would not back the Congress during the coming polls. Yadav was highly appreciative of expelled congress trio -- Sharad Pawar, Tariq Anwar and P A Sangma.

Yadav did not rule out a poll understanding with Pawar's emerging front and asserted that the SP would make every sacrifice to make a third front a reality before the polls.

About the Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Laloo Prasad Yadav, Mulayam Singh said the Rashtriya Loktantrik Morcha would not be dismantled and observed that Laloo Prasad's tie-up with the Congress was not a new development as the RJD government was being backed in Bihar by the Congress.

The SP leader said his party would maintain equidistance both from the BJP and Congress and its manifesto would be prepared by June 30 by a seven-member committee comprising Janeshwar Mishra, Amar Singh, Ram Gopal Yadav, Mohan Singh, Azam Khan, Kapil Deo Singh and Rama Shanker Kaushik.

The SP would oppose the increasing influence of foreign forces in the country's politics and its poll agenda would be to mobilise public opinion against foreign forces interference in politics. Yadav chose to remain non-committal on specific questions against Congress president Sonia Gandhi, and the controversies regarding her ''foreign origin''.

Yadav said both the BJP and Congress were determined to wreck the attempts for revival of the third front as they were strong proponents of the two-party system.

Asked whether the SP considers BSP a part of the third front, Yadav recalled that the BSP twice formed a government with the help of the BJP.

UNI

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