Mayavati at the news conference in Delhi. Picture by Ramakant Kushwaha

New Delhi, May 25: Mayavati today indicated she would support the United Progressive Alliance’s candidate for President but didn’t reveal whether she wanted a Dalit or a Brahmin in Rashtrapati Bhavan.

“My party decided to support the UPA from the outside to keep the communal forces out. That support will certainly continue,” Mayavati, whose Bahujan Samaj Party commands crucial votes in the electoral college, told a news conference.

The Congress had another reason to cheer, too. The Uttar Pradesh chief minister had tea with Congress chief Sonia Gandhi at 10 Janpath but cited a busy schedule to turn down the BJP’s invitation to meet Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

“I got a call from here (10 Janpath) this morning,” she told reporters.

Mayavati and her principal political aide, Satish C. Mishra, were closeted with Sonia and her political secretary, Ahmed Patel, for nearly an hour. But neither side disclosed what was discussed.

The BSP chief had raised expectations that she would today reveal whom she wanted as President. But she kept her cards close to her chest, indicating that the Congress should be prepared for some hard bargaining.

“This is an important matter and my party will have to give due thought to it before taking a decision,” she said.

She said she would sound out her party’s national executive this evening and then her MLAs in Lucknow before “I open my cards to you people”.

Mayavati is expected to arrive in Delhi again on Monday for a National Development Council meeting. DMK chief M. Karunanidhi, too, will be here around the same time to meet the Prime Minister and Sonia.

The BJP tried hard to get Mayavati to meet Vajpayee, who had helped her become chief minister three times.

“But what to do? She said she had a busy schedule,” a senior leader said.

The National Democratic Alliance, which wanted Mayavati’s backing for its candidate if it came to a contest, should be disappointed.

But the Marxists, who have always been cool to Mayavati, appeared thrilled at her statement of support for the ruling alliance.

A CPM politburo member said: “This means if the UPA fails to get the one lakh votes of the so-called third front (the Samajwadi Party, Telugu Desam, Asom Gana Parishad, ADMK and the Indian National Lok Dal), the BSP would still provide a comfortable enough cushion.”