M A I N   N E W S

Samata patch-up chances better
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Jan 8 — Chances of a patch up in the Samata Party today seemed to have brightened up with the dissidents today deciding to withdraw their decision to boycott the party’s national council meeting in Mysore, which began this morning.

Defence Minister and party’s senior leader George Fernandes’ efforts of brokering peace brought about results, but not before he gave an assurance to the dissidents that their views would be heard and “respected”.

Responding to the efforts of Mr Fernandes, rebel MP and President of the Bihar party unit Raghunath Jha said, “We have finally accepted the request from Mr Fernandes to attend the Mysore convention as he has assured us that our views on the merger with JD(U) will be respected,”

He said except for Mr Brahmanand Mandal, the other five disgruntled MPs would leave this evening for Bangalore enroute Mysore. Mr Mandal would not be able to make it to Mysore as he was pre-occupied with engagements in his Munger Lok Sabha constituency, Mr Jha said.

Asked how they changed their decision, Mr Jha explained that it was on the basis of repeated requests from Mr Fernandes, “Who rang us up a number of times from Mysore to withdraw our boycott decision”.

The rebels opposed to merger with the JD(U) had earlier spurned the Defence Minister’s offer to attend the Mysore convention, saying that there was no use going there until Mr Fernandes made it clear that there would be no merger and that Mr Jha would continue as the Bihar unit chief.

They had given Mr Fernandes a week’s time to sort out the tangle and said the rebels would decide their next course of action only after January 14.

The party, which is an offshoot of the Janata Dal, was facing crisis for the past few days after six Lok Sabha members, led by Mr Jha, decided to go against the party’s proposed merger with Mr Sharad Yadav-led JD(U). The party seemed to be facing a split as there was also a move to replace Mr Jha as the Bihar unit chief.

They had been threatening to form a new outfit under the leadership of Mr Jha.

The Defence Minister and the Minister of State for Railways, Mr Digvijay Singh, had been holding parleys with the rebels over the past few days in a bid to avert the split.

MYSORE(PTI): Defence Minister George Fernandes on Monday favoured the imposition of President’s rule in West Bengal.

Asked if he would take any initiative regarding bringing West Bengal under the Central rule, Mr Fernandes recalled the “ bad experience” NDA had in its move to impose President’s rule in Bihar as it could not muster enough support in Parliament.

“Unless the Congress supports it in the Rajya Sabha, we will not be able to do it,” he said.