However, the coalition mantra was accompanied by subtle messages to the Left parties, part of the ruling coalition at the Centre, on the need for a liberal view to expedite economic development.
I cannot go on asking my partners at every stage. As Prime Minister I have to take certain decisions, Gowda said.
Concluding the two-day Janata Dal national camp on the party's role in coalition politics, Gowda said criticism by United Front partners did not worry him.
The discussions were dominated by intra-UF relations and Janata Dal leaders expressed unhappiness over criticism of the government by the Left parties.
Gowda called for tolerance even when government policies were under attack as long as the partners were wedded to secular democracy.
He said the Communist China, committed to a radical approach to economic issues, had liberalised its economy to such an extent that it had secured foreign investment worth $20 billion from the western countries in the last few years.
Although India had been talking about economic liberalisation for the last five years, foreign investment had not even touched $2 billion, he added.
The approach of the undivided Soviet Union to foreign investment when it was at the height of its glory in the 1970s was no different, he said.
Alexi Kosygin, Prime Minister of the erstwhile USSR, had openly told Richard
Nixon, US President at the time, that investment and technology from the US was most welcome, Gowda said.
We also need private investment, both domestic and global, to run the economy efficiently.
He said his government had cleared over 400 projects involving foreign investment worth $5 billion.
Asserting that his six-month tenure was unblemished, the Prime Minister said the only criticism he had faced was regarding his family members accompanying him on official tours abroad, his meeting with Chief Justice A M Ahmadi at the dead of the night and that he had met former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao 28 times after assuming office.
Gowda said the secular forces, despite a lot of bitterness among them, had defeated all three Bharatiya Janata Party candidates in the just concluded Rajya Sabha by-elections in Uttar Pradesh.
Spelling out the task before his partymen, Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda said just as the Left parties would not allow their party interest to suffer, we should also work together to strengthen our party. That is the task.
Janata Dal president and Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav's attack on the Left parties, on the first day of the camp, was less subtle.
In Bihar, Laloo is facing bitter criticism from his Left allies on corruption.
The Left leaders have conveyed to Yadav that they have the right to remind the government of its responsibilities since the government at the Centre was not of the Janata Dal alone.
Listening Post
Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda's response to criticism of the government by the Left parties: I do not blame them ( the Left leaders) as they cannot liquidate their party ... They have to keep the morale of their workers high.
I had taken my grandchildren along with me abroad by paying money from my own pocket was how the Prime Minister justified taking his family members along on recent foreign trips.
JD leader Biju Patnaik, who was conspicuous by his absence on Saturday because of the reported statement against him by party president Laloo Prasad, showed up yesterday. Yadav clarified that he did not intend to denigrate Patnaik and considered the senior leader a father figure of the party.
* The two-day meet was inaugurated and concluded by the Prime Minister.
