In an interview to a private television network, the Home Minister, when asked whether the Vajpayee Government would dismiss the DMK Government to ensure its own survival, said: ``I think the answer to that is no. Merely for the sake of survival there is no question of abusing any Constitutional provision. And this is not confined to Tamil Nadu. There are other states also in the country where there is a strong demand for invoking Article 356.''

He also denied reports that the BJP had a pre-poll understanding with Jayalalitha to dismiss the DMK Government in Tamil Nadu. ``I do not recall any occasion when she mentioned that...as far as the Government is concerned it has been clear on this issue before and after the elections,'' he said.

The Home Minister also contradicted senior BJPleader K L Sharma's statement that the Government would pass a legislation to overturn any adverse verdict in the Ayodhya case. ``I pointed out to him (Sharma) that this position was not the correct position...I told him your statement may have been okay as long as we were (just) part of the BJP and no national agenda had been adopted by the Government. But it has no relevance to the national agenda,'' Advani said.

He, however, defended sending fact-finding teams to Bihar and West Bengal, saying these were sent under Article 355 of the Constitution, which cast a duty on the Centre to protect states against internal disturbances.

``I would say that in order to discharge this duty, the Central Government has to keep itself posted about the goings-on in all the states in the country,'' Advani said.

With reference to West Bengal, the Home Minister said that some political parties, including the Congress, had complained about violence and the state government had denied the allegations. ``This made itimperative to find out the facts and send a fact-finding team to West Bengal.''

On the performance of the BJP-led coalition so far, Advani felt that it had not achieved anything much on the basis of which he could feel satisfied.

``If there are failures, I would not try to blame these on the inexperience of ministers. It may take some time for the political leadership to get used to the bureaucracy, to get used to the ways of administration,'' he said.

He however denied that the Government was being pulled apart by its alliance partners. ``There may be a phase of discussion and deliberation and decisions may be taken after a long time but that is not pulling apart.''

On the Kashmir issue, Advani said the Government was willing to talk to Pakistan. ``We have never shied away from talking about Kashmir. Never. We are willing to talk about Kashmir. In fact, there's a lot to be talk about, including the proxy war and state-sponsored terrorism.'' The Home Minister also admitted that he came to know of thePokharan tests only 24 hours before the exercise was conducted on May 11.