MUMBAI, February 23: Flush from the success of the Congress's Sunday rally at Shivaji Park Sharad Pawar today announced that his party would prefer to seek a fresh mandate from the people rather than raid other parties to form the next government in Maharashtra.Reacting to developments in Uttar Pradesh, the former Chief Minister said at a press briefing that though they had been approached by hordes of dissatisfied independents currently supporting the Sena-BJP government in Maharashtra, the Congress was not interested. "Unlike the BJP which has successfully broken many parties," he added sarcastically.
Pawar's negation may put to rest the spate of rumours about at least 22 of the 45 independents supporting the Sena-BJP government having been won over by Pawar. In fact, several of them were said to have gone underground in preparation for walking over to the Congress.
The leader dismissed such talk adding that though he wouldn't hedge a bet on the numbers, he was sure that the Congress would get"overwhelming majority in this elections in the state."
A confident Pawar said the success would be due to the partnership with the RPI and the Samajwadi Party. Also, he added, "Sonia Gandhi's presence has enthused party workers. The Congress is returning to the poor classes of the country which were so dear to Indira Gandhi," he said.
Commenting on the Uttar Pradesh situation, Pawar was confident that it would not have an impact anywhere else in the country. "Everyone knows how the BJP formed the government in UP and now they have learnt a lesson," he said pointing out, that when Mulayam Singh faced a similar situation few years ago, the BJP had said that he ought to be sacked.
"In 1977 when the Congress lost, Atal Behari Vajpayee and L K Advani had told the then prime minister Morarji Desai that if a party fails to win 50 per cent Lok Sabha seats in a state, it loses the mandate to rule that state," Pawar said mocking BJP's position.
Asked to comment on the Allahabad High Court's interim orderrestoring Kalyan Singh government in UP, Pawar said that he would have to study it before he made any comments. However, he said, "Had the BJP been split and had the Congress been involved in the episode, there would have been some impact (of the court order) on voters. But the government (in UP) was not ours, the defectors were not Congressmen, the new government had nothing to do with the Congress, nor did the Congress have any hand in the episode. So there is no question of the court order affecting us."
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
