Date:14/02/2003 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2003/02/14/stories/2003021410041100.htm

National

Sonia's bid to reach out to other Opposition leaders

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI FEB. 13. The guest list for Sunday's dinner being hosted by the Leader of the

Opposition, Sonia Gandhi, has become a subject of intense speculation. The RSP and the Forward Bloc today indicated that they would be staying away from the 10 Janpath dinner, while the Congress sources maintained that the guest list had "deliberately been kept small" in order to facilitate a meaningful, exchange of views, among the leaders.

Yet another prominent leader, who is yet to receive an invitation, is the Lok Janshakti leader, Ramvilas Paswan.

Sunday's dinner for the Opposition party leaders, the first of its kind hosted by Ms. Gandhi, has already taken on an added hue. The move comes after her tete-a-tete with the Samajwadi Party chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav. Calling the event as a customary eve-of-session dinner, the Congress wants to avoid high expectations.However, senior Congress leaders, as well as some of the invitees, are inclined to look at the dinner as the first, honest attempt to reach out to the rest of the Opposition. "This may not lead to something overnight, but it will certainly help break the ice and establish a personal rapport,'' says a senior Opposition invitee.

Sunday's event would also help the Congress to escape the charge of not taking the lead in bringing the Opposition together. The guest list includes most of the big guns from the Opposition. Prominent among them being the former Prime Ministers, Chandra Shekhar and Deve Gowda, the Samajwadi Party leaders, Mulayam Singh and Amar Singh, the NCP chief, Sharad Pawar, Somnath Chatterjee (CPI-M), Ajay Chakravarti (CPI), allies such as the RJD chief, Laloo Prasad Yadav, Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, and G. M. Banatwalla (IUML), Ramdass Athwale and R.P. Gavai (RPI).

Apart from Ms. Gandhi, among those likely to attend from the Congress are the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Manmohan Singh, Pranab Mukherjee, the Deputy Leader of the party in the Lok Sabha, Shivraj Patil, and the Chief Whip, Priyaranjan Dasmunsi.