Chandigarh, July 15
Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today made it clear that the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) would go with the NDA on the nuclear deal issue and could not be swayed on religious lines to vote in favour of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the trust vote in Parliament.
“We are a secular party and follow ‘sarbat da bhala’ dictum and not the welfare of Sikhs alone,” he said to a question on whether the SAD would support the PM on the N-deal .
The Chief Minister said he respected the PM on a personal level. “But he represents a party which has never supported us. The SAD has never supported the Congress and never will,” he said making the party’s view clear even before the meeting of the core committee of the party.
Badal asserted that the SAD had been consistent in support to the NDA. Badal clarified that his party followed the NDA line on all issues after understanding these and the party was not a blind follower of the NDA.
The Chief Minister said the big question was whether the UPA government should remain in power or not. He said on the nuclear deal the UPA did not take all parties into confidence. “Unless the draft agreement becomes a public document we have no means of knowing what has been agreed upon,” he said adding since the Left parties had also quit the UPA there might be some problem in the draft.
The Chief Minister could not answer a question convincingly why his party had decided to vote against the Prime Minister, despite having got preferential treatment in the allocation of Central funds for both airports and roads in the state. He chose to highlight the state was not getting funds to maintain irrigation facilities.
