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NCP effort to address Left concerns on merger

Special Correspondent

Sharad Pawar to meet Prakash Karat on Thursday

NEW DELHI: Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president and Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar will meet Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Prakash Karat on Thursday to address the concerns the Left parties have about the Democratic Indira Congress (Karunakaran) merging with the NCP.

As a preliminary exercise, NCP general secretary and chief spokesman D. P. Tripathi met Mr. Karat on Monday to prepare the ground for the meeting between the senior-most leaders of the two parties.

Briefing mediapersons about his meeting with Mr. Karat, the NCP general secretary said: "My understanding is that he is ready to consider various aspects of the issue."

Several channels of communication have been opened at various levels between the NCP and the other constituents of the Left Democratic Front (LDF) in Kerala. The NCP refrain at all levels is that "we are part of the LDF and will follow its policies in Kerala".

In fact, NCP leaders underscored the fact that it is because of their commitment to the LDF that a matter, which is essentially an internal affair of the party, is being discussed with the other coalition partners; many of whom are opposed to the merger.

About CPI general secretary A. B. Bardhan's statement on Monday that the DIC(K) would devour the NCP should the merger takes place, Mr. Tripathi said the senior Communist leader had not been properly briefed.

As for the rationale of taking Mr. Karunakaran on board when all his leaders and legislators deserted him and his son K. Muraleedharan, the NCP rejoinder was that "those who have deserted the octogenarian politician are nothing without him; the mass base of the party is still with Mr. Karunakaran."

Also, the NCP dismissed the theory that it was keen on the merger only to have another MLA so as to get a berth in the State's Council of Ministers as the coalition leaders had insisted that ministerial posts would be given to only those parties with at least two MLAs.

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