Clearing the clouds over the fate of his party in the wake of P A Sangma warming up to Sonia Gandhi,NCP supremo Sharad Pawar ruled out merger of his party with Congress,declaring that it would maintain to have its separate existence. At the same time,the Union Agriculture Minister emphasized that the NCP's attitude has been one of understanding and cooperation with Congress and will continue to be so. He said his party favoured working together with Congress in the coming Assembly elections in Maharashtra and "we feel that the party's (Congress) leadership feels the same way,whatever some leaders in the state may be saying". Pawar,whose party will be completing 10 years on June 10,dismissed as a media creation the impression that the NCP was on the horns of a dilemma of whether or not to join the Congress as the issue of foreign origin of Congress President Sonia Gandhi was no longer relevant. The NCP strongman told PTI that the thrust of the thought of Mahatma Gandhi and Pandit Nehru on which the party was based was on decentralisation of decision making process and "we believe that you can develop leadership (at the local level) only through such a process".
