The Hindu : National : LJP will not ally with RJD

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Tuesday, Jun 14, 2005

National

National

LJP will not ally with RJD

Special Correspondent

In favour of electoral alliances with secular forces, says Ram Vilas Paswan

NEW DELHI: The Lok Jan Shakti Party has said it is willing to ally with all secular parties, except the Rashtriya Janata Dal, for the Bihar Assembly elections.

LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan on Monday said he had broached the issue with Communist Party of India leader A.B. Bardhan and Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet on Sunday.

"The LJP reiterates it will not compromise with NDA [National Democratic Alliance] or RJD in the election. The LJP is in favour of alliances with all secular forces other than the RJD," he said briefing correspondents on the national executive deliberations here.

Mr. Paswan said his prediction that the RJD would lose power had come true and claimed that in the coming elections the LJP would get a majority on its own.

Notwithstanding the split in the LJP legislature party, Mr. Paswan said, he had not sided with the NDA to form a government.

In his opinion, a government supported by 17 Independent MLAs and others would have been "worse" than the previous RJD regime and would have led to the consolidation of the Muslim-Yadav equation in the favour of the RJD.

The LJP also criticised the Janata Dal (United), saying that it had been exposed on the Jinnah episode. It had supported BJP president L.K. Advani on the issue but when he took back his resignation, the JD (U) "did not have the courage to distance itself from the NDA." The BJP too, he stressed, was divided on the issue. "In today's context, the BJP can neither speak of Hinduism nor secularism."

Advani's remarks

The LJP national executive had adopted a resolution that while it could not comment on whether Mr. Advani's remarks were politically motivated or genuine, it proved that communal ideology was not acceptable in India.

Another resolution pertained to demands for minorities, including enhancement of the grant to the Maulana Azad Foundation to Rs. 500 crores; raising grants to the Minority Financial Development Corporation to Rs. 1,000 crores; reservation of 10 per cent government jobs for minorities; reservation for the backward Muslim community under Article 341 of the Constitution; unveiling of the portrait of Syed Ahmed Khan in the Central Hall of Parliament; and its support for the move to reserve 50 per cent of seats for Muslims in the Aligarh Muslim University.

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