Return
to Story Page
To print: Select File and then Print from your
browser's menu
NIRMALA GEORGE
NEW DELHI, APRIL 25: Shedding its initial inhibitions. the CPI (M) Politburo today tried to correct its `historic blunder' and cleared the name of West bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu for prime ministership. The Congress, however, flatly refused to buy the proposal.
In an interview to Star News later, the party's leader in the Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee, said, ``When everybody except the BJP has been asking whether Jyoti Basu could be the Prime Minister, even my parry said yes, if the Congress cannot form the government but extends support from outside, Jyoti Basu can be put forward as an alternative. As a matter of fact, that was the decision of the Politburo.''
After a week of negotiations, when Harkishen Singh Surjeet emerged as a better spokesman for the Congress than Congressmen themselves, the party general secretary admitted that their efforts had not amounted to much with the Congress virtually shutting the door in their face. "Our efforts to bring a non-BJP government have failed", Surjeetdeclared, soon after he and West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu met President K R Narayanan at Rashtrapati Bhavan this evening.
"The crux of the problem is that both Mulayam Singh Yadav and the Congress have come to the help of the BJP. They have more sympathy for the BJP than for the Left", Surjeet said.
For Surjeet, the failure to bring around Mulayam Singh Yadav to support the Congress has been nothing short of a personal affront. For the past few years, Surjeet has taken up cudgels for the Samajwadi Party leader. But today, it was obvious that it was all over. Surjeet reserved his harshest comments for Mulayam Singh Yadav, saying the Samajwadi leader had ensured that the BJP would continue in power; at least they would be in government should the President decide to opt for a mid-term election.
Asked about the future of a Third Front government headed by Basu, Surjeet said the Congress had slammed all doors even before alternative options could be explored.
Surjeet referred to the letter handedover by Congress leader Sonia Gandhi to the President where, in the opening sentence itself, the party has categorically ruled out support to any government of the Third Front or a combination of forces.
Lashing out at the Congress, Surjeet said while the CPI (M) had serious differences with the Congress, "the fight with the Congress is class-based, but we never took such an attitude". The stand of the Congress that it would either form the government itself or not support any other formation smacked of misplaced arrogance. "Those days are gone when the Congress thought they can rule the country", he said.
Despite this reversal of its attempts at government formation, the CPI (M) would continue its battle against communalism and relaunch a campaign to go back to the people, he said.
He also took umbrage at Sonia Gandhi's differentiation between parties, some of which she had accused of putting personal interests before the interests of the nation. "She cannot claim she is the defender of the nationalinterest", he snapped.
The CPI (M)'s anger with the Congress stems from its sense of being let down. Surjeet had stuck his neck out in favour of the Congress even while significant sections of the party, particularly in West Bengal and Kerala, were opposed to it.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
------------------------------------------------------------
This story was printed from Net Express located at http://www.expressindia.com. Net Express provides a portal to India, with news from The Indian Express and The Financial Express along with sites on travel and tourism, the entertainment industry, the power sector, the environment and much more.
------------------------------------------------------------