NDA can't ignore Sena power

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, NOV. 25. Although the ruling coalition at the Centre has tried to make light of the Shiv Sena's outcry against the ceasefire initiative in Kashmir, the National Democratic Alliance is in fact more than a little perturbed at the vehemence of the protest.

Not only did the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, rush Mr. Arun Shourie, Minister for Disinvestment, to Mumbai to make peace with the Sena chief, Mr. Bal Thackeray, the NDA convener, Mr. George Fernandes, said the alliance partners should refrain from airing their differences in public although individual MPs, naturally, had the right to express their views in Parliament.

Mr. Fernandes was referring to the sharply different views on the Kashmir initiative aired by the Sena in Parliament. He said the burning of the Prime Minister's effigy by Shiv Sainiks yesterday was ``most deplorable.''

The Sena protest is hurting the BJP even more because it is in tune with the views of a large section of the party's own cadre which sees the unilateral ceasefire offer as a sop to militants and a negation of the declared pro-active policy of the Home Ministry on Kashmir.

`Sabotage of peace process'

The BJP president, Mr. Bangaru Laxman, today tried to explain yesterday's Doda killings as a planned action of sabotage of the peace process initiated by the Vajpayee Government. He said categorically that there was no question of the BJP going back on the offer despite these killings and the massacre of truckers in Jammu a day earlier.

Talking to a select group of journalists, Mr. Laxman said that as the people of the State were fed up with the daily violence inflicted upon them by the militants, they responded positively to the peace initiative; many countries welcomed the move.

However, he clarified, what the Government had already done earlier - that the ceasefire did not mean that the security forces would not act if they were attacked. They would retaliate, and retaliate strongly, he said.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Front Page
Previous : Madhavan hands over report
Next     : India's exclusion was geographical: China