FDI in retail: Mamata Banerjee-less UPA will need Mulayam Singh Yadav on its side, why he may oblige

New Delhi: Mulayam Singh Yadav, crucial to the survival of the UPA government, is making the Congress squirm.  He co-starred with Left leaders today in a massive protest in Delhi against the new reforms introduced by Dr Manmohan Singh. Like the Left and the BJP, the Samajwadi Party chief is also against opening India's vast retail sector to foreign super-chains and has attacked them publicly.

Mr Yadav walked to a police station with Left leaders like Sitaram Yechury and Prakash Karat to court arrest.  But he pointed out that he  did not share a stage with BJP leaders.  I am supporting the government to stop communal forces. BJP se hamara koi vaasta nahi hai (We have no relationship with the BJP)."

Sources say that the regional powerhouse has indicated that he is not ready to be a part of attempts to bring down the government and force mid-term elections. Like the Left and the BJP, the Samajwadi Party chief is also against these reforms and has attacked them publicly. That doesn't mean that the Samajwadi Party won't cash in on the government's new vulnerability.

"Don't take our support for granted," Ram Gopal Yadav, a senior party leader and Mr Yadav's brother, warned earlier this week.  The UPA is in a minority after its biggest ally, Mamata Banerjee, quit the government over last week's decisions to raise diesel prices, reduce the amount of subsidised cooking gas for households, and allow foreign giants like Wal-Mart to set up large retail outlets in India.  Mr Yadav's party has 22 MPS, three more than Ms Banerjee. But his party has said it will not join the government, and that it will decide in the next few weeks whether to continue external support to the coalition. 

In fact, Ram Gopal Yadav, said clearly that the party was prerparing its list of candidates for the 2014 elections, which is when they are due. But remarks like those - and there have been many - are political swagger that belie careful calculations. "Let the Congress get some wisdom," Mulayam Singh had said yesterday. "What have they given the people apart from corruption and rising prices?" he asked.

But behind the scenes, sources in the Congress say that back-channel talks with the Samajwadi Party chief are showing results. After initially announcing that the party would meet today to decide whether to continue support to the UPA, the session has been deferred. Samajwadi Party sources say that their leaders are worried that the Congress' decline could strengthen the BJP and that may bring Narendra Modi to power.

Mr Yadav's party has often justified its support to the UPA as its contribution to ensuring that the "communal forces" of the BJP are restrained.  Uttar Pradesh's large Muslim population is a crucial votebank for the Samajwadi Party. The BJP has been dithering over whether to pick Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as its prime ministerial candidate for the next general election.  Mr Yadav wants to impede any plans that could help Mr Modi's ascension to the national centrestage.

There's also the fact that Mr Yadav's rival, Mayawati, has made it clear that she is firmly on the UPA's side for now.  Since her humiliating defeat in Uttar Pradesh earlier this year - Mr Yadav's son, Akhilesh, powered the campaign and his party's victory and is now chief minister-  Mayawati has found it expedient to team with the UPA on important policies.  Though her party is opposed to FDI in retail, she is not participating in today's bandh or strike.  She has 21 Lok Sabha MPs, just one less than Mr Yadav, and like him, she guaranteed her support to the UPA in a letter to the President when the government was formed.  Even if Mr Yadav kills his support to the government, she can keep it in power. Mr Yadav is unlikely to take any move that would allow her that sort of prominence at the centre.

If that looks like a win-win for the Congress and the government, it will have to consider the fact that Mr Yadav could turn into a tougher opponent of reforms. He warned the government of a "bigger agitation" along with other parties if there is no rollback of its reform decisions. And he knows that with the Trinamool exiting, the Congress' options of allies to support it are also shrinking.

Mr Yadav's decision is important not only for the Congress' future, but also for the way the BJP will plan its next steps. The main opposition party reportedly feels that till the SP decides to ditch the Congress, the BJP will not be in a position to take political advantage of the situation. As long as Mr Yadav keeps the UPA safe, any move to seek a special session of parliament or pushing for a confidence vote to test the UPA's strength could well back-fire.

(with inputs from Agencies)

Mayawati helps government, her party to skip bandh

New Delhi: Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has said it will not participate in the nation-wide strike called by opposition parties on Thursday to protest the government's reform measures announced last week.

This will come as a huge relief to a beleaguered UPA, which is now in a minority in Parliament after the Trinamool Congress announced it was exiting the Congress-led ruling coalition. The ruling party is now looking at the BSP, which supports the UPA from outside, as its best bet to make up the numbers it needs to survive. The BSP has 21 MPs, two more than the Trinamool Congress.

Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party (SP), which has 22 MPs and was for long considered the Congress' Plan B if Mamata Banerjee ditched the UPA, has been playing hard to get. The SP has said it will participate in tomorrow's bandh.

The BSP's Uttar Pradesh chief Ramachal Rajbhar's announced that the party would have nothing to do with Thursday's strike at a meeting of party workers today. Sources in Mayawati's party have said that she will decide on her relationship with the UPA at a meeting of her party on October 9 - the party supports the UPA from outside. Though the BSP too has opposed the hike in diesel prices and the new norms on foreign direct investment in retail effected last week, Ms Mayawati is seen to be the softest on the government right now. Unlike Ms Banerjee or Mr Yadav, who are riding recent electoral successes and would not mind mid-term elections to extend their gains, Ms Mayawati was the big loser in the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections this year and she will not want early polls since she is unlikely to make too many gains.

Diesel price hiked by Rs. 5 per litre, allies demand rollback

New Delhi: The government raised the price of diesel by Rs. 5 per litre on Thursday, prompting angry responses from allies Mulayam Singh Yadav and Mamata Banerjee, who have demanded a rollback. The price hike is aimed at reining in the fiscal deficit and staving off the threat of becoming the first in the BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa) group of emerging economies to be downgraded to junk.

The Cabinet Committee of Political Affairs headed by the Prime Minister left kerosene and petrol rates untouched. It also decided to restrict the supply of subsidised cooking gas to six cylinders per household in a year. The government says about 44 per cent of the total domestic LPG consumers, who consume 6 cylinders or less each year, will not be affected by this decision.

While prices of petrol have been deregulated, diesel is a partially deregulated product. In the past two years, diesel prices have been hiked twice.

West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee said, "We want rollback. I am shocked. The matter is very serious and sensitive; we can't compromise with the people's issue. We will discuss in our party meeting and our plan of action."

"If people do not mind, I will be most happy to withdraw support (to the UPA). If I withdraw support then other parties will provide support to them. And, then ask why we left the UPA which led to its collapse. People had misunderstood us when we had withdrawn support earlier. Therefore, we are having a detailed discussion in the party on these issues," she added, announcing here party would hold a protest rally on Saturday.

The Trinamool's lone minister in the cabinet, Mukul Roy, is not attending a cabinet meeting today that's scheduled to discuss relaxation of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) norms in airlines.

Another UPA ally, the DMK, too has said it opposes the hike. DMK chief M Karunanidhi wants UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to convene a meeting of the alliance's coordination committee. The UPA coordination committee was set up recently to help keep allies in loop on critical policy decisions.

The Samajwadi Party, which provides external support to the UPA, also said it wants an immediate rollback. "The decision is ill-timed and will hurt the common man," Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav told NDTV.

Even the Congress says  it was not in favour of such a steep hike. General Secretary Digvijaya Singh said, "We are not in favour of a hike in diesel prices to such an extent because it hurts the farmers and common man. At the same time, there are some unpleasant decisions that have to be taken by the government by taking an overall view of what is best for the country."

Reacting to the diesel hike, C Rangarajan, chairman of the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council, said the government had taken the right decision, and that fiscal deficit had to be contained. He told a private TV channel that an increase in diesel prices in India should help avert a credit rating downgrade for the country.

The BJP has slammed the government and senior leader Yashwant Sinha warned of mayhem in the economy. "This is going to cause undue hardship. Prices are not under control. This will lead to overall inflation," he said. Prices, he said, could have been increased in small doses.

The Left parties too want a rollback. Gurudas Das Gupta of the CPI said, "I have never seen such a massive increase. It will stimulate inflation and aggravate the economic slowdown, which will cost jobs. We will protest in every way we can."

However, the price hike led to some respite for the oil companies. State-run oil marketing companies are losing Rs. 550 crore everyday on under-recoveries as a result of higher crude prices in the global markets. They make a loss of Rs. 17 per litre on diesel sales, Rs. 32.7 per litre on kerosene sales, and Rs. 347 per cylinder on cooking gas sales every day.

"Diesel accounts for 53 per cent of total subsidies. Oil companies are running a deficit of Rs. 6000 crore every month. We are committed to cutting petrol prices whenever possible. By reducing excise duty on petrol, we have brought down the gap between the prices between petrol and diesel. A narrow margin between petrol and diesel will be good for economy. If prices of petrol fall internationally, we will pass on the benefits," said RS Butola, Chairman of the Indian Oil Corporation.

"This is a very good decision, and will certainly help oil companies and reduce the burden on the government in terms of subsidies. The reduction in the excise duty on petrol is good for us," said Bharat Petroleum's Chairman RK Singh.

The government subsidises the prices of diesel, cooking gas and kerosene to dampen inflation and protect the poor, a popular policy that has put a severe strain on public finances.

The government has acknowledged earlier that a price hike is essential for curbing fiscal deficit, a pre-condition for reviving growth in Asia's third-largest economy. A price increase will also aggravate inflation, as costs, such as road freight rates, will rise.

(With inputs from agencies)

Mulayam Singh Yadav talks of mid-term polls again, doesn't discount him becoming PM

Kolkata: Mulayam Singh Yadav has sewn up his election game plan in Kolkata and says those elections can happen before 2014. And though he has clearly taken a lead in cobbling together a non-Congress and non-BJP alternative, he insisted today that any Third Front would take shape only after the next Lok Sabha elections.

Mr Yadav has made no bones about the fact that after his party's spectacular showing in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, he is eyeing a bigger role for his party at the Centre. Asked if he was in the running for being the next Prime Minister, the veteran politician said, "I am not in line, but I am not a sadhu-sant (saint) either.

The Samajwadi Party, he said, would fight elections alone. "The Third Front can happen only after the polls. It will depend on the situation," Mr Yadav said. He also refused to say who of the two West Bengal rivals, the Left and Mamata Banerjee, would be part of such a Front, merely stating that, "We will keep good relations with all parties." Mulayam Singh Yadav has for years had political affinity with the Left parties and has joined hands with them on several issues like FDI in retail and the coal allocation scam in recent times.

But the Yadavs, Mulayam and son, Akhilesh, have also indicated during the Kolkata sojourn that they are willing to explore new equations. Mr Yadav said today that he had the greatest regard for Ms Banerjee and described a meeting between her and son Akhilesh yesterday as "very good talks." After the meeting Mr Yadav junior had said, "After coming to Kolkata, I would not have felt good not meeting Didi. It was necessary to meet her." Just a few months ago, the Congress managed to blunt a growing closeness between Mr Yadav and Ms Banerjee ahead of the Presidential elections. Ms Banerjee partners the Congress at the Centre, but that relationship has been at breakpoint for some time now. 

A common political imperative binds Mamata Banerjee and Mulayam Singh Yadav - both would like early elections to consolidate on their big wins in their respective states. In the first flush of victory and from a position of strength they know that they are likely to do much better now than after two years, when the honeymoon period is well over and anti-incumbency factors set in. Ms Banerjee swept the Assembly elections in West Bengal last year; Mr Yadav's Samjawadi Party won UP early this year.     

What Mr Yadav was startlingly unambiguous about today was where exactly he stood in his equation with the Congress, that leads the UPA government at the Centre.

"Let me make it clear, the Samajwadi Party does not support the UPA government. The Samajwadi Party is against communalism. If the Congress is weakening and needs support against communalism, we may provide that support." Not words of comfort for the ruling party which depends heavily on Mr Yadav to bail it out at crucial moments. Mr Yadav's assertion today that "the situation is such there may be elections earlier than 2014," makes it worse.

For three days in Kolkata, where his party is holding a convention, Mr Yadav has appeared determined to prove he's on a different team. Yesterday he had slammed the Congress for financial scams, especially the coal swindle that has forced the government on the defensive amid allegations of entrenched corruption. This after referring to his Samajwadi Party as the opposition on Monday.

That distancing from the Congress continued today when he said that both the national parties - the Congress and the BJP have weakened and are plagued by issues. He said that he would not field a candidate in Congress president Sonia Gandhi's constituency Rae Bareli as a return of favour for the Congress not contesting against his daughter-in-law Dimple in the Kannauj by-election a few months ago, but would not promise the same in Amethi, Rahul Gandhi's constituency. His party colleagues had made things rather awkward yesterday by saying that they saw little political ability in Rahul Gandhi.  Today Mr Yadav wished Mr Gandhi much luck.

(With PTI inputs)

Mulayam Singh Yadav talks of mid-term polls again, says he has high regard for Mamata Banerjee

Kolkata: Mulayam Singh Yadav has sewn up his election game plan in Kolkata and says those elections can happen before 2014. And though he has clearly taken a lead in cobbling together a non-Congress and non-BJP alternative, he insisted today that any Third Front would take shape only after the next Lok Sabha elections.

Mr Yadav has made no bones about the fact that after his party's spectacular showing in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, he is eyeing a bigger role for his party at the Centre. Asked if he was in the running for being the next Prime Minister, the veteran politician said, "I am not in line, but I am not a sadhu-sant (saint) either.

The Samajwadi Party, he said, would fight elections alone. "The Third Front can happen only after the polls. It will depend on the situation," Mr Yadav said. He also refused to say who of the two West Bengal rivals, the Left and Mamata Banerjee, would be part of such a Front, merely stating that, "We will keep good relations with all parties." Mulayam Singh Yadav has for years had political affinity with the Left parties and has joined hands with them on several issues like FDI in retail and the coal allocation scam in recent times.

But the Yadavs, Mulayam and son, Akhilesh, have also indicated during the Kolkata sojourn that they are willing to explore new equations. Mr Yadav said today that he had the greatest regard for Ms Banerjee and described a meeting between her and son Akhilesh yesterday as "very good talks." After the meeting Mr Yadav junior had said, "After coming to Kolkata, I would not have felt good not meeting Didi. It was necessary to meet her." Just a few months ago, the Congress managed to blunt a growing closeness between Mr Yadav and Ms Banerjee ahead of the Presidential elections. Ms Banerjee partners the Congress at the Centre, but that relationship has been at breakpoint for some time now. 

A common political imperative binds Mamata Banerjee and Mulayam Singh Yadav - both would like early elections to consolidate on their big wins in their respective states. In the first flush of victory and from a position of strength they know that they are likely to do much better now than after two years, when the honeymoon period is well over and anti-incumbency factors set in. Ms Banerjee swept the Assembly elections in West Bengal last year; Mr Yadav's Samjawadi Party won UP early this year.     

What Mr Yadav was startlingly unambiguous about today was where exactly he stood in his equation with the Congress, that leads the UPA government at the Centre.

"Let me make it clear, the Samajwadi Party does not support the UPA government. The Samajwadi Party is against communalism. If the Congress is weakening and needs support against communalism, we may provide that support." Not words of comfort for the ruling party which depends heavily on Mr Yadav to bail it out at crucial moments. Mr Yadav's assertion today that "the situation is such there may be elections earlier than 2014," makes it worse.

For three days in Kolkata, where his party is holding a convention, Mr Yadav has appeared determined to prove he's on a different team. Yesterday he had slammed the Congress for financial scams, especially the coal swindle that has forced the government on the defensive amid allegations of entrenched corruption. This after referring to his Samajwadi Party as the opposition on Monday.

That distancing from the Congress continued today when he said that both the national parties - the Congress and the BJP have weakened and are plagued by issues. He said that he would not field a candidate in Congress president Sonia Gandhi's constituency Rae Bareli as a return of favour for the Congress not contesting against his daughter-in-law Dimple in the Kannauj by-election a few months ago, but would not promise the same in Amethi, Rahul Gandhi's constituency. His party colleagues had made things rather awkward yesterday by saying that they saw little political ability in Rahul Gandhi.  Today Mr Yadav wished Mr Gandhi much luck.

(With PTI inputs)

Mulayam Singh Yadav's strong remarks against government, praise for Mamata

Kolkata: In a stinging critique of the UPA government, Mulayam Singh Yadav said his Samajwadi Party (SP) was in the opposition on Tuesday. He said that the SP was fulfilling the role the opposition by questioning the policies of the government, which he said had no direction.

The Samjawadi Pary supports the UPA government from outside and has bailed it out on several occasions, including the presidential elections recently and most importantly the confidence vote brought against the UPA-I government after the signing of the India-US nuclear deal and the Left's withdrawal of support.  "We are against their (UPA's) policies which they must correct. That is the role of the opposition and we are fulfilling it," he said in Kolkata.

"There is a huge challenge before the country... especially before us who in the opposition," he said.

The SP leader was speaking mostly about the coal scam that held up the entire monsoon session of Parliament and put the government on the mat.

"You can see there is no clear policy and we don't know where they want to take the country. No one can say. We sit everyday in the Lok Sabha.We listen. We are in touch with the govt, but there is no direction," he told reporters.

Mr Yadav  clearly distanced himself from the government on this issue. During the monsoon session, he had also organised a protest outside Parliament against the coal blocks allocation scam, along with the DMK and the Telugu Desam Party.

Not only will this open criticism and taking up the space of the opposition worry the Congress, so will the fact that all of this was happening in Mamata Banerjee's capital. Ms Bannerjee has been the toughest ally that the Congress has had to deal with and her positions often allied with those of the opposition.

Mr Yadav had several good things to say about Ms Banerjee, whom he called hard-working and a fighter, though also stubborn. This cosying up of the two leaders could also give the Congress heartburn over a possible third front emerging. In fact, Mulayam's brother and senior SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav said as much,"We pray that there's a third front."

The two were last seen together before the Presidential elections, where Mr Yadav first supported Ms Banerjee against Pranab Mukherjee's candidature and was then won over in a matter of 48 hours by the Congress. He was also given pride of place during the government's annual report card event at the Prime Minister's residence.

Samajwadi Party's 21 Lok Sabha MPs have also been seen by the Congress as a counter to the 19 that Ms Banerjee has, whenever it looked like she would pull out of government.

From: NDTV