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Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's decision to cut short his two-day visit to Lucknow has sparked off a controversy in Uttar Pradesh's political circles.
Vajpayee, who had arrived in Lucknow on Saturday, left the city seven hours ahead of his scheduled departure on Sunday.
While the prime minister's abrupt return to New Delhi was officially attributed to a "bad throat", political circles were abuzz with rumours of Vajpayee wanting to avoid an imminent confrontation with party dissidents.
The prime minister had admitted before a TV channel on Saturday evening that there was some dissidence in the Bharatiya Janata Party -- a partner in Bahujan Samaj Party-led coalition government in Uttar Pradesh.
"That is nothing unusual in a coalition...these problems will be sorted out soon," he told the TV channel.
Apart from cancelling a press conference and reducing a major public function to a mere ritual, the prime minister also did not attend a gathering organised by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh.
What added spice to the rumour mills was the absence of Chief Minister Mayawati at the PM's press conference, where he made just a brief appearance.
Vajpayee took everyone by surprise when he walked into the specially erected 'pandal' for the press conference on the Raj Bhawan lawns to declare that he would not be interacting with the media on account of a "bad throat."
"Much as I wanted to have a long question-answer session with you all, my bad throat is not allowing me to do so," he told the reporters. "If my throat improves by evening, I will speak to you at the airport," he said.
Half-an- hour later news came that the prime minister would depart for Delhi at 1 pm.
"He had to cut-short his stay here and return to New Delhi as he is not feeling well," a senior official told journalists.
Dissatisfied with the recent expansion of the Mayawati cabinet, a band of 18 BJP legislators had demanded that the party pull out of the coalition government.
Since Vajpayee had refused them an audience, the dissidents were planning to raise their grouse before him at the RSS show in the evening.
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