MUMBAI: Despite recent statements by the Congress party leaders about the possibility of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) merging with the Congress prior to the forthcoming Assembly elections in the state in October, the NCP has ruled out merger with the Congress.
A senior NCP leader who returned to Mumbai after attending the first working committee meeting of the party in New Delhi on Tuesday told Arab News on Wednesday that the NCP view was clear that it would not merge with the Congress in any circumstances, but would continue with the grand old alliance with the Congress for the Assembly polls in Maharashtra.
Speaking about the constant demand of federal Minister for Heavy Industries Vilasrao Deshmukh to break alliance with the NCP and fight the Assembly polls on its own, a NCP spokesman said it was in the best interest of the party to ignore such demands.
“The alliance with the Congress will continue and that demands to break it off were the views of some Congress leaders and not that of the Congress. The NCP does not attach much importance to such demands and is committed toward it alliance with the Congress,” he said.
Meanwhile, Deshmukh on a tour of Nagpur on Wednesday told journalists that the political environment was favorable to the Congress in the state which would help it in the forthcoming elections.
Deshmukh said that he was still in favor of the Congress going alone it in the polls. “I have conveyed the sentiments of the party workers to the Congress High Command and Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi to adopt the Uttar Pradesh formula that the Congress would perform much better without any alliance for the Assembly polls,” he said.
Reacting to the frequent outbursts against his party by Deshmukh, federal Agriculture Minister and NCP supremo Sharad Pawar asked the party cadre to be prepared to go alone for elections in the state, if the Congress was against forging alliance with the NCP. Pawar, who was addressing party cadres in Mumbai on Wednesday, cautioned that in case the Congress and NCP fight the polls separately it would only benefit the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance.
Pawar also blasted the Hindu extremist Bharatiya Janata Party leaders L.K. Advani and Narendra Modi and mocked at the duo’s failed attempt to help the BJP win elections and form government in New Delhi.
He said that “Advani was not a face that the people of the country liked nor the people liked the language that Modi used against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.”
More than that the middle class people were of the view that Singh has saved the country from adverse effects of global recession, he said.
The NCP leader said that the United States has denied visa to Modi due to post-Godhra incident in Gujarat and Varun Gandhi’s hate speeches during election campaigns led the Muslims to support the Congress.
