UPA 'gone', time for 'new kind' of political formation: NCP

NEW DELHI: The UPA is "gone" and a new formation is needed to provide opposition to the Narendra Modi-led NDA government at the Centre, NCP today said.

NCP general secretary DP Tripathi, whose party was the second-largest constituent of the Congress-led UPA-II, also said that the era of "anti-Congressism" was over with the BJP at the helm.

"UPA is gone and a new kind of formation and a new political idiom is needed," he said even as he dismissed suggestions that NCP will help the government secure the passage in Parliament of the land Bill in its current form.

Noting that the Left and the centrist parties will have to evolve a common strategy in the changed scenario, he told reporters here that no party can play the "big brother" in the opposition alliance.

He said that an important transition was underway in the politics of the country and, therefore, the UPA was no longer valid and relevant in such a situation.

It is not "any but many" which will run the government as well as the opposition, Tripathi said, adding that unity among the opposition parties was already being seen with the various constituents of the 'Janata Parivar' trying to come together.

He noted that the then Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar was the head of the Group of Ministers which had formulated the UPA's land Bill, which the Modi government is now trying to amend.