The Hindu : National : Pawar strikes a note of warning

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Tuesday, Jan 11, 2005

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National

Pawar strikes a note of warning

MUMBAI, JAN. 10. The Congress today faced more trouble from its alliance partners with the Nationalist Congress Party chief, Sharad Pawar, threatening to end his tie-up with the party for the coming Assembly elections.

Mr. Pawar is upset with the Congress' seat-sharing pact with the Jharkhand Mukthi Morcha in Jharkhand saying the NCP was not consulted. ``If the Congress does not change its approach towards its alliance partners in the United Progressive Alliance Government, the NCP would have no other choice than to contest the Assembly elections on its own,'' said Mr. Pawar.

He was reacting to electoral understanding reached by the Congress and the JMM on January 7 for the Assembly polls in Jharkhand under which the JMM would contest 35 seats and the Congress 33.

Mr. Pawar said the Congress had only 145 members out of 543 in the Lok Sabha while the UPA had more than 300 members.

``So I hope that the Sonia Gandhi-led party will realise that 50 per cent of the alliance members are those other than from Congress, supporting the UPA Government,'' Mr. Pawar said.

But, he expressed confidence that the issue would be resolved and all alliance partners would continue to support the Congress to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliance in the elections.

`No differences with Deshmukh'

Mr. Pawar ruled out any differences with the Maharashtra Chief Minister, Vilasrao Deshmukh, and said his party would like to campaign for the Congress candidates in the January 24 by-elections in the State. "There are no disputes, differences or misunderstanding between me and Mr. Deshmukh. We met for the first time today after he took over as the Chief Minister," Mr. Pawar told reporters, reacting to reports that there were differences between him and the Chief Minister.

In a sarcastic comment on the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee chief, Prabha Rau, for criticising the NCP, Mr. Pawar said: ``MPCC chief Prabha Rau, having a massive public support and a powerful leader who strengthened the Congress in the State, has the right to make statement on us and we do not want to snatch it."

— ANI, PTI

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