M A I N   N E W S

NDA decides on Alexander
Meeting to approve presidential candidate today
Rajeev Sharma
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, June 8
Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee held a day-long meeting with his top ministerial colleagues today wherein the government is understood to have decided to put up Maharashtra Governor P.C. Alexander as presidential candidate in the July 15 election.

A meeting of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will be held here tomorrow at 4 pm where the NDA is likely to put its stamp of approval on Mr Alexander’s name.

Home Minister L.K. Advani, External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh, Defence Minister George Fernandes and Communications Minister Pramod Mahajan were among those present at today’s meeting at Mr Vajpayee’s residence. The meeting lasted virtually whole day.

Well-placed sources said the Prime Minister and his ministerial colleagues decided to back Mr Alexander for the post of President even if consensus is not reached on his name.

The opposition parties, particularly the Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the Left, are likely to differ with the NDA on the candidature of Mr Alexander. Some parties may even have angry reaction to Mr Alexander’s name, observers say.

As barely a week is left for the presidential election, it is becoming increasingly clear that a contest may well be on the cards. The Congress Working Committee (CWC) was meeting till late in the evening today to thrash out the party’s stand on the issue of presidential election.

It is understood that the Congress may well set up its own candidate against the NDA’s candidate. The names of Deputy Leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha and former Lok Sabha Speaker Shivraj Patil and former Finance Ministers Pranab Mukherjee and Manmohan Singh as the presidential candidates of the Congress are doing the rounds.

Interestingly, a former Sadar-e-Riyasat of Jammu and Kashmir, Dr Karan Singh, presently Rajya Sabha member of the Congress, is understood to have told the high command that he was confident of getting the support of the Telugu Desam Party and the AIADMK if he were to be made the Congress’s presidential candidate.

Congress bracing up for contest
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, June 8
The Congress today indicated that it would not shy away from a contest for the post of President and the party was in touch with the People’s Front on the issue.

Senior Congress leaders had a meeting at the residence of party President Sonia Gandhi this evening to discuss the party’s strategy. The meeting was attended by several CWC members, apart from political secretaries to Ms Gandhi.

The hardening in the stand of the Congress came after impression gained ground in the party that the NDA was likely to name Maharashtra Governor P.C. Alexander as its candidate for the top post.

The Congress leaders, who had been favouring a second term for President K. R. Narayanan, indicated that they would press him to contest.

They did not rule out the possibility of Congress President Sonia Gandhi meeting Mr Narayanan over the next few days to persuade him on contesting the poll and to know his mind on the issue. There was hope in the Congress till today even of a cross-party consensus emerging on the name of Vice-President Krishan Kant, but with reports about Mr Alexander surfacing as the NDA choice, the Congress was bracing itself for a contest.

While Mr Alexander’s role as Governor in the wake of the Justice Srikrisna report on the Mumbai riots was a sore point with the Congress, the party had not forgotten Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray supporting a second term for him as Maharashtra Governor.

Congress leaders supported the stand taken by the People’s Front today that any candidate “foisted” by the NDA in Presidential poll would be opposed by opposition parties.

Though the Congress leaders felt that Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee might still consult Ms Gandhi and other opposition leaders before a presidential candidate was announced by the NDA, they said the possibility of a consensus had receded due to “leaks” in the media over the past few days.