Vadodara: Though the Congress and the Samajwadi Party (SP) were unable to have a pre-poll alliance, SP General Secretary Amar Singh on Friday indicated that his party was not averse to have an alliance with the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance.
The pre-poll alliance in UP, will not be an issue after the poll results, as Congress will not be able to form the government without SP's support at the Centre, Singh said at Harni Airport on his arrival from Uttar Pradesh.
"As we are a secular party and Congress will need our support in its efforts to form the government at the Centre," Singh said.
Singh was in Vadodara to make announcement that SP will put up seven candidates in Gujarat.
"My party position is weak in Gujarat as we have no base but we will contest seven seats in the state to improve our position here," Singh said.
"Despite Ahmed Patel (Political Secretary to Sonia Gandhi) being my good friend, my party will field Kanaksinh Mangrola from Bharuch parliamentary constituency (home constituency of Patel) in Gujarat," Singh said.
"We will put our party candidates from seven seats in Gujarat and Mangrola has been authorised to take decision on selection of candidates for the remaining six seats," he said.
The party has decided to put up candidates for the Lok Sabha seats of Panchmahals, Kheda, Anand, Mehsana, Navsari and Bharuch besides the Union Territory of Dadranagar Haveli, the SP leader said.
This means SP will be putting up candidates against high profile candidates like Union Textile Minister Shankersinh Vaghela contesting from Panchmhals, Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dinsha Patel from Kheda and former GPCC chief Bharatsinh Solanki from Anand seats.
Singh also made it clear that SP will not join hands with any party in Gujarat.
Samajwadi Party Gujarat unit President Surendrasinh Yadav said that actors like Sanjay Dutt, Jaya Bachchan and Jayaprada are also likely to visit Gujarat for campaigning purpose.
The SP has declared candidates for 74 seats out of the 80 constituencies in Uttar Pradesh and both the parties were locked in hard bargaining over seat sharing, raising questions over the future of their alliance in the northern state.
"In fact our party on Tuesday held out an olive branch to the Congress but the latter said there was no scope for further negotiations with it for any pre-poll alliance in Uttar Pradesh," Singh said.
Comments
0 comment