Azad: Cong wants like-minded parties to remain together
LUCKNOW: The Congress on Saturday hinted it was open to an alliance with like-minded parties for the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
“We want all the like-minded parties to remain together,” said All India Congress Committee general secretary (incharge UP) Ghulam Nabi Azad here.
He was responding to a question whether the Congress would align with the Samajwadi Party or the Bahujan Samaj Party in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Azad was here to attend a divisional convention of partymen at Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee (UPCC) headquarters.
Earlier, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav had said he was “not thinking of an alliance with any party” and “his style of politics is different”. He had also said he is open to ‘friendships’ with like-minded parties.
Senior Congress leaders insist although the party was preparing to go it alone in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, they admit a decision on alliance may be taken by the party high command at the last minute. Asked whether the Congress would support BSP chief Mayawati for the Rajya Sabha, Azad said the Congress was not strong enough (numerically) to support any candidate in the biennial elections.
He used the occasion to target the BJP, alleging it was using the enforcement directorate and the income tax department to browbeat the opposition. A senior party leader said the Congress was making efforts for a grand alliance.
CENTRE’S BOFORS MOVE A BID TO GAIN CHEAP PUBLICITY
Congress general secretary Ghulam Nabi Azad said the central government’s move to pursue the Bofors pay-off case was an attempt to gain “cheap publicity” ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
He made the comment a day after the CBI filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging a 2005 order of the Delhi high court quashing all charges against accused persons in the politically-sensitive case.