Congress set to debate alliances
The Congress is speaking in different voices on the issue of alliance ahead of the “chintan shivir” being held in Jaipur on January 18 and 19.
The party, which has been leading a coalition government at the Centre since 2004, has never been comfortable with this very concept.
In fact, a senior heavyweight of the Congress party on Saturday asked why do regional parties fight Lok Sabha elections when they do not have national programmes, national vision and national organisational structure.
Asked does it mean that there would be no United Progressive Alliance (UPA)-3, he asked why not?
The issue of alliance would certainly be discussed in the party’s brain storming session.
There is a growing realisation in the Congress that regional parties in the UPA and supporting it from outside are the main hurdles in its attempts to regain lost grounds. The Congress party has not been gaining in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal with or without alliances. The Congress may be wanting alliances on its term without compromising secularism but it has not helped it at the ground level, insiders conceded.
This issue had also dominated in the “Vichar Manthan Shivir” held at Panchmarhi and Shimla in 1998 and 2003 respectively. If the UPA-1 was the Congress’ strategy to unseat the BJP-led NDA from power in 2004, the UPA 2 was a sort of compulsion. The Congress had modified its line on alliance in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections by confining it to states. In the UPA-1, the Left parties were its friend outside West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura and the Congress had even left some seats for them. The Left had supported the UPA government from outside till 2008 on the common minimum programme. But in the UPA -2, the scene had changed with the Left, the RJD, LJP, MDMK, PMK, and TRS fielding candidates against it.
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