The Communist Party of India-Marxist on Tuesday made fresh efforts to persuade Dravida Munnetra Kazhaghan chief M Karunanidhi to join a Congress-led coalition government at the Centre but made it clear that the Left parties would not be doing so.
CPI-M general secretary Harkishen Singh Surjeet held a 20-minute meeting with Karunanidhi in Delhi in this regard.
To a question if the Left front is reconsidering its stand against getting into the government, Surjeet said, "At the moment, there is no reconsideration. Our strength is not such that we would be able to influence policies."
Meanwhile, veteran Marxist leader Somnath Chatterjee has been re-elected leader of the CPI-M Parliamentary Party in the Lok Sabha.
He was elected unanimously at the meeting of the central committee of the party, which has 43 members in the new House.
On reports about his becoming the Lok Sabha Speaker, Chatterjee told PTI that a section of the party does favour this possibility but another section feels it would be difficult to run the party affairs in Parliament if he became the Speaker.
The veteran Marxist parliamentarian, who has spent over 30 years in Parliament, had been the pro-tem Speaker in the 13th Lok Sabha as he was the senior-most member of the House. This time round, he was elected to Parliament for the 10th time.
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