Whether the Samajwadi Party’s sabre-rattling about pulling out of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is tactical or whether the party really means it will be decided at a special national conference in Agra, beginning tomorrow.
The compelling need to feel wanted led SP leaders to make remarks highly critical of the government both during the discussion on the general budget and in the course of parliament debates. Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav’s view on the 2009-10 budget was that it was “sour, tepid and unimpressive”. His party shut down Parliament for a day over a proposal made by a government it officially supports, that his security be scaled down.
Party general secretary Amar Singh, while convalescing in Singapore, criticised the Centre for ‘giving in’ to the developed world on climate change and Yadav attacked petroleum minister Murli Deora for allegedly favouring some industrial houses while discriminating against others.
However, senior managers in the ruling Congress, including Pranab Mukherjee, have cleverly played on the SP’s dilemma: that if it vacates the space in the UPA it occupies, the Bahujan Samaj Party, its bitter rival, will move in.
SP cadres advise caution. They say it is hard to fight both Mayawati and Sonia Gandhi at once and say SP must decide who its primary enemy is. Moreover, the reason for the SP’s tally in the Lok Sabha dropping from 39 in 2004 to 23 now is clear; its biggest support base, the Muslims, are slowly moving back to the Congress.
Therefore, while it pays for the SP to be critical of the Congress, it cannot afford to be too critical either.
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The Agra meeting will help decide many of these complex issues.
"There have been suggestions to withdraw support to the Congress. We will listen to the delegates on the issue," Mulayam Singh Yadav said here, ahead of the National Executive meeting of the party, which will finalise the agenda for the three-day national conference. Blaming the Mayawati government for the "plight" of common man, he said an agitation programme could be finalised.
For the record, the SP chief dismissed suggestions that Muslims were feeling alienated from the party, especially after the expulsion of firebrand leader Mohammed Azam Khan, and Yadav's closeness with former BJP leader Kalyan Singh, who is a special invitee to the conference.