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NDA in talks with TDP to counter Trinamul

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

The Atal Bihari Vajpayee government is chalking out a strategy to strengthen its position in Parliament to ward off any threat from disgruntled members of the National Democratic Alliance.

"We are not taking any chances with our government's stability. Our party is aware that one or two allies in the NDA might withdraw support... You cannot please everyone. In view of the impending winter session of Parliament, the BJP will do everything to keep the government's parliamentary strength intact," said a former vice-president of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Sources in the party said efforts were on to rope in Chandrababu Naidu's Telugu Desam Party to pre-empt a possible withdrawal of support by the Trinamul Congress. The latter is unhappy with the government's decision to increase the prices of petroleum products.

Sources said Prime Minister Vajpayee recently met the TDP chief and requested him to join the government.

Vajpayee is understood to have emphasised to Naidu that he was fed up with the tantrums of some NDA allies and since the TDP had been a reliable partner, it should now join the government.

Senior TDP Lok Sabha member K Yerran Naidu, however, professed ignorance about the likelihood of his party joining the government. "Oh, it is news to me, you people are better informed I must say," Yerran Naidu joked.

Senior BJP leaders K Jana Krishnamurthy and Narendra Modi too maintained that they knew nothing of any such move. Krishnamurthy, however, pointed out that it was the government's prerogative to ensure its stability.

"Despite numerous predictions of the government's imminent collapse, the Vajpayee government is cruising along. There are problems, but nothing which cannot be ironed out," Krishnamurthy contended.

Some other sources in the party said Vajpayee would not get into a confrontation with the Trinamul Congress. "I think he will declare a token roll-back to keep [Trinamul chief] Mamata [Banerjee] happy," said a source.

Significantly, the Trinamul Congress has kept its communication channel with the Congress in West Bengal open.

State Congress president Pranab Mukherjee and the party's chief whip in the Lok Sabha, Priyaranjan Dasmunshi, are in touch with Banerjee. But it remains to be seen whether the informal Trinamul-Congress understanding fructifies into something more concrete.

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