NEW DELHI, 16 May 2004 — Newly elected Congress MPs yesterday chose Sonia Gandhi as head of their parliamentary caucus, effectively naming her as their choice for prime minister.

“Very shortly, a Congress-led coalition will be in place at the center, providing a stable and secular government,” Sonia said after her election as the leader of Congress Parliamentary Party.

She promised Indians a better life with more jobs, accelerated economic growth and social harmony.

Giving the first glimpses of the kind of government she would put in place, Sonia immediately identified job creation as one of her top priorities.

“We have an enormous task ahead of us. The road is wrought with difficulties, the challenges are vast. Let us not be complacent,” she said.

Sonia also promised to “respect” her allies and partners, and work closely with them. “We will soon finalize a joint plan of action with them. This plan will outline our priorities, policies and programs as one cohesive unit,” she said.

She said the election result showed that the people had “decisively rejected the destructive and self-serving policies of the BJP government.”

Later Sonia met senior CPI-M leader Jyoti Basu and invited the Marxists to join the government. “The idea is to have a coalition government,” she told reporters.

Basu told reporters he had no problem with Sonia becoming prime minister.

“She is an Indian citizen,” he said. “She is married to an Indian. She is leader of a major political party. It was for Congress to put forward who will be their leader.”

The CPI, too, backed Sonia for the post.

“We have no objections to Sonia Gandhi becoming the prime minister,” CPI leader A. B. Bardhan said.

Asked to comment on Sonia’s relative political inexperience, Bardhan said that her husband, slain former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, had also been inexperienced when he was chosen to head the government.

“Was Rajiv Gandhi experienced enough when he became the prime minister, or for that matter even (outgoing Hindu fundamentalist prime minister) Atal Behari Vajpayee?” he asked.

Some in the Bharatiya Janata Party, however, were clearly aghast at a person of foreign origin taking the reins of the country.

BJP’s Sushma Swaraj said she would quit her parliamentary seat if Sonia were to become prime minister.

Swaraj, a former parliamentary affairs minister, said Congress had never said it would make Sonia prime minister during the elections and the mandate for the party should not be misinterpreted.

“I do not want to take part in this national shame. I will resign from Parliament if Sonia Gandhi takes over as prime minister. I cannot address her as ‘Madam Prime Minister’,” Swaraj told reporters.

In televised debates before the elections, Swaraj had said Sonia was Congress’ biggest liability.

Sonia herself has been non-committal about whether she wants the job, though analysts said that her emphasis on Congress leading the coalition — rather than a left-led government supported by Congress — indicated she was ready to accept the country’s top job.

In meetings over the next few days, Congress and its allies will arrive at a consensus over who should head the coalition government.

That consensus candidate will then ask President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam for permission to form a new government for the country, which with a billion-plus people is the world’s largest democracy.

The parties willing to support or join the coalition government are expected to hand in their letters of support today, following which Sonia will stake her claim to form the government.

“Fifty percent of the allies have already given letters of support to Ms. Gandhi,” Sonia’s political secretary, Ahmed Patel said.

The Left parties are expected to hand over their letters of support by this evening. They have been invited to attend a joint meeting of allies being held today.

The DMK, MDMK and PMK — the three parties from the southern Tamil Nadu state — are expected to hand over their letters after DMK leader M. Karunanidhi’s meeting with Sonia.