The Hindu : National : Congress, Left playing spoilsport: Mulayam

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Wednesday, Apr 07, 2004

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National

Congress, Left playing spoilsport: Mulayam

By J.P. Shukla

LUCKNOW, APRIL 6. The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and Samajwadi Party leader, Mulayam Singh Yadav, today accused the Congress and Left party leaders of playing the spoilsport in the formation of a secular front in Uttar Pradesh.

His party general secretary, Amar Singh, had waited for 20 days with his proposal to have an understanding among secular forces to oppose the Bharatiya Janata Party but these leaders were more interested in greeting the Bahujan Samaj Party president, Mayawati, by offering her a bouquet of flowers on her birthday and paid no heed to the pleadings of Mr. Amar Singh, Mr. Yadav said.

Talking to newspersons at the party headquarters here, Mr. Yadav said while there was an understanding between the BJP and the BSP over nominating their candidates in the Lok Sabha elections, his party alone was capable of stalling the march of saffron forces in Uttar Pradesh. The results would prove that the BJP had been trying to mislead the people by unleashing a false propaganda of the achievements made by the National Democratic Alliance Government to cheat the voters but all their efforts went in vain.

Mr. Yadav said that the character of the BJP had been completely exposed by now with innumerable scams taking place during the past five years having become a thing of public knowledge.

Jethmalani's proposal rejected

Mr. Yadav rejected the proposal of the eminent jurist, Ram Jethmalani, to nominate him as the common Opposition candidate for the Lok Sabha against the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, from Lucknow.

The Bahujan Samaj Party was the first to announce the name of its candidate from Lucknow. His party followed by announcing the name of Madhu Gupta. The Congress did not take any steps to nominate a joint opposition candidate against Mr. Vajpayee during the intervening period and the campaign of Mrs. Gupta had gone much ahead by now. It was, therefore, not possible for him to withdraw his party candidate at this stage, Mr. Yadav said.

Referring to Amethi, Mr. Yadav said his party did not nominate any one to contest the Amethi seat as it was the constituency of Sonia Gandhi. Ms. Gandhi, however, moved to Rae Bareli from where his party had already announced the name of its candidate. The Samajwadi Party had already selected a candidate to contest the byelection to Amethi Assembly seat and a decision on the Amethi Lok Sabha seat would be taken, considering various other aspects, he added.

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