At the `marriage of convenience' as his detractors might love to call it, Vaghela announced that the Congress was going to be the last party in his career as politician and that his main objective to join the mainstream political party was to throw the ``mean and corrupt'' Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) out of power both at the Centre as well as in Gujarat.

``I will see to it that the 1998 Lok Sabha election result was reversed and the BJP does not get even seven seats in Gujarat'' Vaghela said. ``Who can know the BJP better than I do? And I tell you, there is no need to be afraid of the BJP...it is just like a TB patient who looks okay only because of drugs but is actually very sick'', he assured his new-found colleagues in the Congress, telling them that ifthey adopted an aggressive posture against it, the BJP would be forced to cow down.

Knowing fully well what had been plaguing the Congress most, Vaghela said that ``there will not be an RJP group within the Congress..I will not allow any distinction between RJP and Congress.'' The presence of senior leader Madhavsinh Solanki was suggestive of the fact that the KHAM (Kshatriya, Harijan, Muslim and Adivasi) theory was going to be exploited to the hilt during the forthcoming election.

Welcoming RJP to the Congress fold, GPCC president C D Patel said he was particularly happy about the fact that the RJP had adopted a one-line resolution empowering Vaghela to deal with the Congress on merger issue. The convergence of secular forces was necessary to defeat communal parties like the BJP, he said.

Patel said that though the merger was unconditional, care would be taken to accommodate senior leaders in the party organisation at all levels right from taluka to the PCC.