Door still open: BJP

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, MARCH 26. The BJP today said the possibility of an alliance with Ms. Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress for the coming Assembly polls in West Bengal would depend upon her spelling out her party's relationship with the NDA in clear terms.

``It is for Ms. Banerjee to clear the confusion in the ties between Trinamool and the NDA. Till she clarifies her stand, the possibility of an alliance will also be mired in uncertainty,'' the BJP general secretary, Mr. Narendra Modi, said. Addressing a press conference at the party headquarters here, Mr. Modi also spelt out the BJP's strategy for contesting the coming Assembly polls in five States.

While insisting that the BJP was keeping its ``door open'' for an alliance with the Trinamool Congress, Mr. Modi passed the onus of striking the alliance on to Ms. Banerjee who had quit the NDA coalition in the wake of Tehelka expose.

``We even went to the extent of accepting the idea of a `Mahajot' (a grand alliance) to defeat the ruling Left Front

in West Bengal. Our door is not closed, we are ready to wait for some more time. It depends upon the determination of Ms. Banerjee to defeat the CPM in polls in West Bengal,'' Mr. Modi said.

Asked about the ongoing talks between the Trinamool Congress and the Congress for an alliance in West Bengal, Mr. Modi said the Congress was caught in a strange position because it wanted to take the help of the Left parties in capturing power at the Centre but was ready to oppose them in West Bengal.

Referring to party's partnership in DMK-led alliance in Tamil Nadu, Mr. Modi said the seat-sharing arrangement had already been worked out and the BJP would contest 21 seats there. Similarly, he said, the party would enter the poll arena under the DMK's stewardship in Pondicherry. In Kerala, the BJP would try and make its ``presence felt'' by entering into alliance with regional parties.

The BJP would go it alone in Assam and had no ties with the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP). Its poll plank was ``security and development'' in Assam. While the Congress had a secret pact with ULFA, the AGP had one on the similar lines with the Surrendered ULFA (SULFA). ``We are approaching the people with an appeal to get rid of both - ULFA and SULFA,'' Mr. Modi said.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : National
Previous : SC notice to TN on Madhani bail plea
Next     : EC directive on model code