NEW DELHI, 7 March 2004 — Former Minister for Law and Justice and senior Supreme Court lawyer Ram Jethmalani says he is willing to fight Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Lucknow if he is accepted as a common candidate in the upcoming general election.

“I am not ruling out... I will not mind contesting against Vajpayee in Lucknow if it is a one-to-one contest,” Jethmalani, who has of late been critical of the BJP-led government, told reporters here yesterday.

However, he said, his decision was not final and asserted that he was working for unity of like-minded secular forces to defeat BJP in the elections.

The Rajya Sabha MP attacked BJP’s “feel good factor” and its “India Shining” campaign.

He said the shine perhaps was reflected in the expensive posters of the government, rather than in the burgeoning figures of India’s poor, the unemployed and the illiterate.

He stated the government was least bothered about the tremendous wastage of stored food grain.

Jethmalani called for all political parties to fight corruption jointly and shun all corrupt officials. He stressed the need for politicians to focus on “public good”, rather than “party good”.

He made it clear that the present government was not working in conformity with ethics and hinted at politicians in power accepting bribes.

Jethmalani said there was need for opposition forces to unite against communal forces.

On Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani’s plans to go on a countrywide yatra (march), Jethmalani said Advani was not at all concerned about the citizens of the country and feared the march could raise sectarian passions.

He refused to comment on speculation he might join Congress.

Senior Congress leader, Kapil Sibal, who was at Jethmalani’s press conference, lauded his speech and agreed with him that the country’s pluralism was being destroyed by the present government and that political parties should join to counter this.

Referring to the BJP slogan of “India Shining”, he wanted to know whether India was not shining when it became a republic in 1950 and has it been shining only since 1998, obviously referring to the fact that India was prosperous even during Congress rule.

Sibal said that Advani’s yatra was to fool the people and publicize the so-called performance of the government.