New Delhi: Prakash Karat, leader of the Communist Party of India-Marxist, said that he would be open to talking to the Congress to help support the formation of an alternative national government after a general election.
"We can do business with them and ask them to support an alternative secular formation; it's possible--why not, I don't rule it out," Karat said in an interview to a news channel.
The CPI-M is a major force behind a "Third Front" of smaller regional parties that aims to challenge the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party. The Left Front, which is led by the CPI-M, quit their support for the ruling Congress-led coalition last year over opposition to a civilian nuclear deal with the United States.
"It's not a question of untouchability. We'll do business with all parties but that business will be circumscribed by the nature of the mandate," Karat said.
Karat's statement signals that despite a bitter war of words between the Left parties and Congress over that nuclear deal, they could once again try and form a government.
The CPI(M) was the biggest of several left parties that backed the Congress government for four years after the last 2004 general election, blocking many economic reforms.
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