PM firm, sit-out threat by ally
- A moment to pause before a milestone
RADHIKA RAMASESHAN
New Delhi, May 21: The DMK this evening threatened to sit outside the government, unable to turn around Manmohan Singh who insisted his council of ministers should have a clean reputation and prompting Sonia Gandhi to call on the Prime Minister late tonight.
Singh, who is said to have reservations about at least two DMK nominees who were ministers in his erstwhile council, reportedly put his foot down and refused to accommodate them.
The dramatic turn of events came less than 24 hours before Singh was to be sworn in Prime Minister for a second term.
Sonia was in the Prime Minister’s house well past midnight. If a solution is not found before 6.30pm — the swearing-in has been pushed back by an hour for procedural reasons — Singh is likely to keep the disputed ministries with him for the time being, sources said.
The DMK’s vocal display of discontent, suitably aired before television cameras, came in the evening. “My leader Karunanidhi has advised me to inform that the DMK will support the government from outside,” said T.R. Baalu, one of the nominees reportedly disfavoured by Singh.
The purported reason for the DMK’s disenchantment is the Congress’s failure to set aside the berths — both in quantity and quality — sought by the southern ally which, with 18 MPs, is the second largest partner after the Trinamul Congress.
However, sources said the biggest sticking point was the inclusion of the names of Baalu and A. Raja — both ministers in the first UPA government — in a list Karunanidhi sent across to Pranab Mukherjee. The list, handed over by Baalu himself to the Congress’s chief interlocutor, was the political equivalent of a red rag as the bigger party had conveyed to the DMK the Prime Minister’s misgivings about certain nominees.
No specific charges were raised against any individual. But a whiff of controversy had hung around some ministries handled by Baalu and Raja last time. Baalu had looked after shipping, road transport and highways, while communications and information technology were run by Raja. Some of these ministries handle contracts that deal with crores of rupees.
His hands no longer tied by mercurial allies — the UPA now has the pledged support of 304 MPs even without the DMK which in any case has offered backing from outside — the Prime Minister is learnt to have told his party that he might be willing to let “political” nominees fill economic portfolios but he should be allowed to pick a clean team.
During the day, Singh phoned Karunanidhi, camping at the capital’s Tamil Nadu Bhavan with his family, who said the Congress’s stand was unacceptable. As part of the brinkmanship, the DMK claimed that Karunanidhi had blocked seats in three airlines to leave Delhi tomorrow morning if the talks collapse.
Officially, the DMK found fault with the Congress formula of one berth for every seven MPs, saying such an arrangement was not in existence in 2004 when the southern ally had two MPs less but three cabinet berths and five ministers of state. The DMK now wants nine berths, but the Congress is not willing to offer more than five or, at the most, six.
But the intractable issues are the two ministers and Karunanidhi’s demand that three relatives be accommodated. Allies such as Mamata Banerjee are also wary of giving too many berths to the DMK and opening the government to the risk of corruption charges.
Some allies like the NCP, however, are said to be pushing the line that allies should be allowed to retain the portfolios they held.
The NCP was sulking after word was out that the Congress wanted to bifurcate the agriculture and food supplies ministry held by Sharad Pawar. The Congress saw a “conflict of interest” in coupling the two departments because the pricing mechanism for agricultural produce had allegedly been devised to help the NCP’s core constituency of the “kulaks” of west Maharashtra.
The National Conference is also unhappy — Farooq Abdullah is apparently going ahead with plans to proceed to South Africa tomorrow to watch the IPL.
The above picture speaks volumes.
Our gentleman prime minsiter says namaste as our culture would tell us to do.
But the lady standing in front who calls herself a Gandhi but is actually a Vadra just stands there gawking and grinning.
Is this the respect you show your elders or have you become so haughty that you forget the minimum courtesy?
But that is not why I am writing today.
I am pleased to note that our prime minister who himself is honest is now trying to surround himself with honest colleagues. It is about time.
During his last stint, because of numbers he could not do so and had to put up with the likes of Shibu Soren and Lalu Yadav.
I am surprised at the audacity of Karunanidhi and the DMK.
Upto now, they had taken Tamil Nadu as their fiefdom, now they are reaching out to Delhi to create a new fiefdom.
No subtelety or hide and seek about it.
Karunanidhi wants four ministerial posts for his relatives.
This would be the first step in the Congress's efforts to root out corruption.
I wish our PM every success in his fight against corruption.
He may count on my support.
Not having Lalu in the cabinet would have another benefit.
Now they can start a campagn for limiting the number of children to one or two. With Lalu there, they could not as he (with 10 children) had set a bad example.
No comments:
Post a Comment