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Wednesday, Jan 12, 2005

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National

UPA: no accord yet

By Javed M. Ansari

NEW DELHI, JAN. 11. Senior United Progressive Alliance leaders today got down to the business of trying to reconcile their conflicting claims in Bihar and Jharkhand for the Assembly elections. Despite two hours of negotiations among the leaders of the Congress, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Left parties and the Nationalist Congress Party, there was no agreement in sight. A breakthrough is likely tomorrow when the alliance leaders call on the UPA chairperson, Sonia Gandhi.

The senior Congress leader, Arjun Singh, said that while an agreement had not yet been reached, the alliance partners were unanimous in taking on the "communal and divisive forces jointly."

The RJD chief, Lalu Prasad, echoed Mr. Singh's views. "We are in the process of reaching an agreement. We will make sure that the UPA is not adversely affected and that the communal forces don't get gain any advantage," said Mr. Lalu Prasad. Two days ago, he set the cat among the pigeons by threatening to go it alone in Bihar in protest against the Congress decision to work out a separate agreement with the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha in Jharkhand.

Mr. Lalu Prasad was a much mellowed man today. Earlier, he had flown in here from Patna and was closeted with the leaders of the Left parties. He called on the CPI(M) general secretary, Harkishan Singh Surjeet, and the CPI(M) Polit Bureau member, Sitaram Yechury.

Later, he drove to Mr. Arjun Singh's residence where he met senior Congress leaders, M.L. Fotedar and Ahamad Patel, the CPI leaders, A.B. Bardhan and D. Raja, and the NCP leader, Tariq Anwar.

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