Buoyed by the overtures from the Shiv Sena, which it has for the moment rejected, the Nationalist Congress Party opened a new front of possible confrontation with the Congress — urging the party to support NCP candidate Anugraha Narain Singh in the Allahabad (North) Assembly constituency in the coming Uttar Pradesh polls.

NCP general secretary and spokesman D P Tripathi, who released a list of 26 seats that the party will contest in UP, chose his words carefully. “We appeal to the Congress not to contest against Anugraha Narain Singh. The traditional abode of the Nehru-Gandhi family, Anand Bhavan, which falls in Allahabad (North) should be wrested from the BJP and only our candidate can do this,” he said. Anugraha Narain Singh, he added, had won the seat twice in the past and had come second three times while the Congress had not won this historically important constituency since 1980.

If the Congress “allows us to defeat the BJP, then we will back Congress candidates in the rest of Allahabad,” he said. The NCP would even “organise a road show” for Rahul Gandhi in Allahabad and NCP scion Supriya Sule would join the road show if the Congress backed the NCP in just that one seat, Tripathi added.

Although the NCP has no significant presence in UP, the party’s bid to remain close to the Left rather than the Congress is being played out here as well. Just as in Kerala where the NCP had a tie-up with the LDF rather than the UDF, the NCP has decided to support all CPI(M) candidates in UP but has no such arrangement with the Congress.

... contd.