Third front just a mirage, says Pawar dismisses idea of third front as mirage

NEW DELHI: Accused by the CPM of keeping “mum” on Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray’s overtures, NCP supremo Sharad Pawar on Tuesday dismissed as “mirage” the idea of a third front and said his party was committed to strengthening secular forces.

Steering clear of the Left’s criticism of his party joining hands with Shiv Sena in Pune Municipal Corporation, Mr Pawar sought to rebuff BJP leader LK Advani’s appeal to replicate the ‘Pune pattern’ in Maharashtra to get rid of Vilasrao Deshmukh government.

“We are least interested in it and we have made our position clear earlier too,” Mr Pawar said making light of Mr Thackeray’s statement that his party was ready to support the NCP president for the post of prime minister in case he decides to join a ‘third front’.

Mr Pawar said when it came to Maharashtra and the nation, his party’s policy was “there is no compromise” with communal forces. “We want to be with the secular forces and strengthen the UPA,” he said. Suggesting that it was a different ballgame at the local level, he said that when it came to local self governments, the leadership there took decisions, keeping in view the conditions there.

He said that in the state, the Congress has tied up with “others” in some places and the NCP also, implying thereby that there were adjustments at local levels in some places with the Shiv Sena and the BJP.

Mr Pawar’s statement assumes significance as it comes in the wake of reports of a possible realignment of political forces at the national level after the UP polls. The CPM had not looked kindly at the silence of the NCP leader over the Sena chief’s attempts to lure him away from the UPA by dangling the prime ministership of a third front government.

In a recent visit to Maharashtra, Mr Advani had made a candid overture to the NCP saying his party would welcome any move on the ‘Pune pattern’ that would see the exit of “non-performing” Vilasrao Deshmukh government.

The CPM, in an article in the latest issue of party journal ‘People’s Democracy’, had assailed the NCP’s tie-up with the Shiv Sena in Pune for the mayoral posts. Giving the example of Maharashtra, where the Congress and the NCP were locked in a “no holds barred contest”, the Left party had said the Congress and its UPA partners “have also contributed to facilitating some of the successes of the BJP and the communal forces”.

“Consorting with the Shiv Sena is an unpardonable act for a secular party,” the article said, adding that the “growing disenchantment” of the people was reflected in the electoral defeats suffered by the Congress in the assembly polls in Punjab and Uttarakhand or that in Delhi Corporation.