Vajpayee 'communalising atmosphere', say allies

By Neena Vyas

NEW DELHI, DEC. 8. Several allies and supporting parties of the Vajpayee government - the Telugu Desam, the Trinamool Congress and the Indian National Lok Dal - today virtually charged the Prime Minister with ``communalising the atmosphere'' by his statements on the Ram temple issue over the last two days. This, they said, had sent a ``wrong message'' through the country, and something needed to be done ``to correct this''.

Simultaneously, the Trinamool Congress asked the convener of the National Democratic Alliance, Mr. George Fernandes, to call an urgent meeting of the NDA to discuss the Babri Masjid-Ram temple issue.

Party leaders made it clear that they were participating directly or indirectly in the NDA government and ``if something inappropriate is said or done we will speak out.'' The allies hoped that the Prime Minister would somehow retrieve the situation although they stopped short of demanding that he withdraw his statements.

The Trinamool leader, Ms. Mamata Banerjee, said something must be done to ``stop this immediately'' and the most important concern today was ``to save the country (from this growing communalisation).'' They wanted their strong views on the matter to be conveyed to the Prime Minister, and this the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Mr. Pramod Mahajan, promised to do.

The issue was discussed threadbare at a meeting of party leaders called by the Speaker this afternoon to try and find a way out of the deadlock that prevented Parliament from functioning whole of this week. Party leaders spoke their minds freely, and the allies were almost one with the opposition in expressing their anguish and even anger at the manner in which the Ayodhya issue had been raised.

The Government also expected fireworks, and before the Speaker's meeting, the big five of the BJP in the Government - Mr. Vajpayee, Mr. L. K. Advani, Mr. Jaswant Singh, Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi and Mr. Pramod Mahajan - met in the Prime Minister's office and discussed how to proceed with the damage control exercise.

Later, Ms. Banerjee and Mr. K. Yerran Naidu, TDP parliamentary party leader, told reporters that in Rae Bareilly yesterday, a small madrasa-mosque was pulled down and in retaliation some Hindu structure was damaged. ``Now the Prime Minister must clarify. Communal tension is spreading at the grass roots level. At this critical juncture the Prime Minister must clarify what he meant by his statements,'' Mr. Naidu said.

Ms. Banerjee said a ``wrong message'' had gone throughout the country, ``communal tension has increased'' and ``correct information must come from the Prime Minister so that this is stopped.'' ``Pehle desh ko bachana hai (the country must be saved first),'' she added and made it clear that her party considered the three contentious issues of the BJP part of the ``communal agenda.''

There is no doubt that if the Speaker decides in favour of a debate under Rule 184, which ends with a vote, the allies will speak out their minds, although they are not likely to upset the apple-cart at the Centre.

Mr. Naidu and Ms. Bannerjee were especially peeved that although they had met the Prime Minister yesterday and raised the issue of his statement, what happened in the evening was not a clarification or a dilution of his earlier statement, but an elaboration. ``We had both told him that there can be no deviation from the NDA agenda,'' Ms. Banerjee said. But what happened in the evening yesterday was not what they expected. As a hurt Mr. Naidu kept repeating, ``it was totally unwarranted, what was the need?''

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