| Pranab sitting pretty, BJP backs Sangma |
NEW DELHI The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and Left parties split on Thursday over the presidential poll as some of their constituents pledged support to United Progressive Alliance (UPA) candidate Pranab Mukherjee who appears set for a runaway victory over PA Sangma, backed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), All India Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and Biju Janata Dal (BJD).
As momentum for the July 19 poll picked up, BJP announced its support for Sangma while its major ally Janata Dal (U) expressed backing for Mukherjee, becoming the second ally after Shiv Sena to break ranks with the NDA.
Showing deep divisions between BJP and JD(U) over the issue, leaders of the two parties held separate press conferences within an hour of each other to announce support for rival candidates.
The poll to elect the president also divided Left parties, with Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) and Forward Bloc deciding to support Mukherjee while Communist Party of India (CPI) and Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) opting to abstain from the voting.
Mukherjee, with support of JD(U), CPM and Forward Bloc, now has at least 629,000 assured votes out of nearly 1.1 million votes, well beyond the required number of 549,442.
BJP leaders Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley said the party decided to support Sangma, whose candidature has been proposed by AIADMK and BJD, after trying unsuccessfully to evolve a consensus within NDA on it.
They noted that JD(U) and Shiv Sena had not agreed on supporting Sangma and instead backed Mukherjee but insisted that it will have no impact on the “mature” coalition of NDA.
Swaraj and Jaitley argued that it was BJP’s duty, being the main opposition, not to allow a “walkover” to UPA which did not “consult” it before announcing its candidate.
Soon after, JD(U) chief Sharad Yadav announced support for Mukherjee and said his party was against any contest after former president APJ Abdul Kalam refused to enter the fray.
Seeking to justify BJP’s decision to have a contest despite some major allies being against it, Jaitley said his party could not support a government which is using “various manoeuvres”, including investigative agencies, for “keeping one political class” to stay in power.
When referred to the fact that even BJP leaders like Maneka Gandhi and BS Yeddyurappa had supported Mukherjee’s candidature, Swaraj said such things happened before the party took a decision and now everyone will speak in one voice. She said BJP would try to bring Trinamool, which broke ranks with UPA, also on board and talks were on for it.
Four Left parties, whose top leaders, including Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury (CPM), AB Bardhan (CPI), TJ Chandrachoodan (RSP) and Debabrata Biswas (FB), held a meeting here, also failed to arrive at a consensus.
Karat said his party has decided to support Mukherjee as “in the present situation, he is the candidate for the post of president with the widest possible acceptance”.
Forward Bloc general secretary Debabrata Biswas said his party was not in favour of abstaining from the voting.
RSP general secretary TJ Chandrachoodan said his party will abstain from the voting so also the CPI.
Congress slammed BJP for supporting “borrowed” candidate Sangma just for the sake of a contest and rejected as “childish” its complaint that it was not consulted before UPA zeroed in on Mukherjee.
Agencies
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