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Mulayam non-committal Sonia as PM

May 11, 2004 23:43 IST
Last Updated: May 12, 2004 02:41 IST


Samajwadi Party president and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav says he will not be part of the National Democratic Alliance in the event of a hung Parliament.

He also declined to comment on the willingness of Communist Party of India-Marxist to accept Sonia Gandhi as the leader of a Congress-led coalition.

"My party's parliamentary board will meet after the Lok Sabha results are declared and decide our role and strategy in the post-poll scenario. I have no comment to offer on the stand of the Left parties," Yadav told Zee News on Tuesday night.

He expressed happiness over the SP opening its account in Andhra Pradesh by bagging an assembly seat.

Meanwhile, Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar is expected to meet Gandhi in Delhi on May 14, a day after Lok Sabha results are out.

NCP sources said Gandhi had spoken to Pawar over telephone on Monday to discuss the post-poll scenario in the backdrop of exit polls projecting a hung Lok Sabha and talk of the possibility of a non-NDA alliance getting the numbers to stake claim to form a government.

Pawar told reporters in Mumbai that all efforts would be made to form a non-NDA government at the centre.

Gandhi has already initiated the process of cobbling a non-NDA alternative by having talks with CPI-M general secretary Harksishan Singh Surjeet and CPI leader D Raja.

He welcomed the Congress party's observation that in the event of the Congress-led coalition getting the required numbers, senior leaders of the alliance would sit together to arrive at a decision on the prime ministerial candidate. "There is no two opinion on this," he said.


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