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Kalyan Singh praises Mulayam

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Kalyan Singh has said the contest in the mid-term election will be between Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Sonia Gandhi. "The people will have to decide between a swadeshi prime minister and a foreigner prime minister," he said.

In an interview with UNI, Singh said, "Mr Mulayam Singh did a great favour to the people of this country by preventing Mrs Sonia Gandhi from assuming power. In the process Mr Yadav compensated for his act of dislodging the central government without any viable alternative."

The chief minister, however, did not spare the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Congress for thrusting yet another election upon the people.

The undoing of these parties would help the Bharatiya Janata Party to attain an absolute majority under Vajpayee's leadership, he asserted.

Singh said the act of the Opposition, especially Mulayam Singh Yadav, was "childish" because they could only trigger the fall of the government but not form an alternative government.

"The people of this country will never forgive those who dislodged the popular government of Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee and put an additional burden to the tune of Rs1200 crore [1 crore equals 10 million] on the state exchequer on account of fresh elections," he said.

Holding the Congress mainly responsible for this, he said the events also exposed once again the duality of the BSP which connived with the former ruling party to defeat the vote of confidence. "A single vote cost the nation Rs1200 crore," he said.

In reply to a question, Singh said he always considered the BSP a "treacherous" party. Without naming any party or individual, he observed, "I pity those who rely upon it."

Reacting to Mayawati's statement that her party, by ousting the Vajpayee government, had taken revenge for what the BJP had done in Uttar Pradesh when her party was sharing power with it, Singh said she had "already ditched my party in Uttar Pradesh by withdrawing support to the government".

Singh said his party had accepted the challenge of facing a mid-term poll. "It is now left to the electorate to decide if they want a stable government which lasts five years or want mid-term polls every year."

In the present political scenario, the people are bound to discard a non-BJP coalition, he said. "Despite the Opposition tirade, many regional parties have joined hands with us. This indicates that voting in the next election will be in favour of the BJP," he said.

UNI

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