Pawar says he’ll make Sangma come around

Stopping short of taking names, NCP president Sharad Pawar said that nobody in the NCP can seem to act against party policy while remaining ...

Stopping short of taking names, NCP president Sharad Pawar said that nobody in the NCP can seem to act against party policy while remaining in it.

‘‘I don’t have to emphasise this point because it is stated in the general body resolution of NCP that no one can join the NDA. If at all one does, then he will have to resign from NCP,’’ Pawar told a news conference today.

Up against a faction of the party’s north-eastern states led by senior leader P.A. Sangma, Pawar said he was scheduled to meet Sangma tomorrow noon and would make every effort to persuade him to stay back. When asked whether his reminder about the party resolution, moved by Sangma himself, was a signal to the latter, the Maratha strongman said, ‘‘I am talking about myself. The question put was whether I will join NDA after elections. But the NCP resolution makes it clear that anyone who joins NDA will have to resign from the NCP.’’

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Pawar accused the BJP of attempting to drive a wedge between the Congress and NCP through false propaganda that he would join the NDA after the Lok Sabha polls. He maintained that the NCP stands for forging an alliance of like-minded parties believing in a common minimum programme to provide an alternative to the NDA.

On Sonia Gandhi’s foreign origin, Pawar observed that in an era of coalitions parties have to come to terms with occasions where they have to agree for a common programme, keeping aside such basic issues. He drew a parallel with the BJP putting Ayodhya issue on the backburner in favour of the NDA.

Pawar said, there was no alternative to coalition politics in the prevailing political situation as no single party was capable of forming a government. ‘‘People will have to digest this,’’ he said.

Asked to react on Rahul and Priyanka formally joining the Congress, Pawar said: ‘‘What can I react on that. It is for them and Congress to decide.’’

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Pawar said he had initiated talks with like-minded parties including Congress, DMK and leaders like Laloo Prasad Yadav, Ram Vilas Paswan and others.

On the potential prime ministerial candidate of the NCP-proposed coalition, Pawar said: ‘‘This is not as important as taking the party policies in right earnest to the people. If your approach is right, people will accept you.’’