New Delhi, July 9: President Pratibha Patil has directed Manmohan Singh to meet her on Thursday evening to give “his views on the political developments” arising from the Left pullout and the Samajwadi Party’s offer of support to the government.
Patil is expected to ask Prime Minister Singh to seek a confidence vote in Parliament within 10 days.
Singh is scheduled to return from Japan late tonight.
Congress sources said a special one-day session of the Lok Sabha would be convened on July 21 or 22 for the trust vote. The government-sponsored motion is expected to say: “This House expresses confidence in the council of ministers.”
The Indo-US nuclear deal, which provoked the crisis, will figure in the debate. If the government survives the trial of strength, a month-long monsoon session will be called from August 11.
The council of ministers and Congress leaders have been asked to stay put in the capital till July 22.
Asked how the UPA was placed, a Congress source said: “It is not a cakewalk but we will go through. We are putting in the maximum effort.”
The Congress is counting on the following circumstances to pull the vote through:
The fence-sitters and “committed” Opposition MPs do not want an early election and could, therefore, support the motion or abstain.
“Whoever votes against us votes against Parliament and wants an early poll. Those like the BJP and the Left have no choice but to vote against us,” a source said.
Although the Shiromani Akali Dal is part of the NDA and runs a government in Punjab along with the BJP, it is apparently in a “dilemma” because a “vote against Singh would tantamount to a vote against India’s first Sikh Prime Minister”.
“We are a faith party and a silent campaign can do us a lot of harm,” said an Akali MP. But, for the record, the party said Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal was maintaining they were with the NDA.
The Akali Dal has eight MPs. If they choose to abstain, the House strength and the halfway mark will get reduced, making the UPA’s job easier.
The Sikh diaspora is apparently pressuring Badal to back Singh in the “community’s cause”.
The argument that the “sense of the House is we must deal with the US” may accentuate the quandary of the Telugu Desam, which swears by reforms and globalisation and has a vast Telugu diaspora to answer to. The party will find it difficult to oppose the motion then.
As the Congress’s crack team of strategists — comprising Pranab Mukherjee, Ahmed Patel, Kapil Sibal, Prithviraj Chavan and Vayalar Ravi — fine-tuned the numbers required to crawl past the majority mark, Sonia Gandhi today called a meeting of the Congress Working Committee on Friday to formally endorse the Samajwadi’s support.
Samajwadi sources hoped they would not lose more MPs than the two, Chaudhury Munnawar Hasan and Jai Prakash Rawat, who have left to join the Bahujan Samaj Party.
Mulayam Singh Yadav’s key aide Amar Singh kept vigil on three more MPs who skipped today’s parliamentary party meeting pleading illness and personal reasons.
A fourth from the Etawah region, who lost his seat in the delimitation exercise and was not given another one despite winning thrice, said he would “grab” an offer from Mayavati.
Vaiko’s MDMK, which quit the UPA last year, has since split. Two from the breakaway group, L. Ganesan and Gingee N. Ramachandran, said they would vote with the DMK.
Mukherjee and Patel are expected to tap parties like the Janata Dal (Secular), National Conference, PDP, Rashtriya Lok Dal and the Trinamul Congress. If there is a breakthrough, the Prime Minister will speak to the leaders.
Asked if the votes came with strings attached, Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari claimed: “We neither wheel nor deal nor steal. We have asked for support in national interest. There comes a time in the life of political parties when you have to stand up and be counted. The Indian polity, with notable exceptions, has parties who will stand up and be counted.”
