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Jaya hopeful on tie-up with Congress

All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam General Secretary J Jayalalitha today said she had not laid any precondition for an alliance with the Congress for the Lok Sabha election.

Addressing a press conference in Madras, she said the prospect of an alliance with the Congress, with whose leaders she had held two rounds of preliminary talks, was bright.

Asked whether there would be any power-sharing arrangement with the Congress in case the Congress-led front won the election, she said this would depend upon the outcome of the election.

Jayalalitha's statement is in sharp contrast to the statement of Congress Working Committee members Manmohan Singh and A K Antony, who, after their talks with her, had stated that their party would form a popular single party government if they won the elections.

She said further talks would be held with the Congress for reaching an agreement on seat sharing.

Earlier, addressing new entrants to the party at the AIADMK headquarters, Jayalalitha declared that no party at the Centre could form a government without the support of the AIADMK.

She also scoffed at the Congress for belittling regional parties at the Pachmarhi conclave, and added that the AIADMK was not a regional party but a national one.

At the press conference, however, she was vague about who would lead the alliance in the state. "You will see who will lead the alliance in course of time," she said.

Asked whether her party was trying to rope in the Tamil Maanila Congress, she said her party was not trying to rope in anybody; it is the Congress which is doing that.

All secular parties should come together to defeat the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Bharatiya Janata Party, she said.

UNI

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