New Delhi, May 12
CPM leader Sitaram Yechury today met UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and discussed about possible candidates for the next President.
Sources said informal discussions have been taking place between UPA leaders and their Left partners for the past two weeks during which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held talks with CPM general secretary Prakash Karat, his CPI counterpart A.B. Bardhan and Forward Bloc’s Debabrata Biswas.
With the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections over and the composition of the electoral college for the presidential poll quite clear, the first task of the UPA and its allies is to evolve a consensus on a candidate which could then be conveyed to the NDA.
Sources said the Left parties would be meeting in the capital on May 16 to decide on their strategy for the presidential poll.
Talking to reporters after releasing special issues of ‘People’s Democracy’ and ‘Lok Lahar’, Yechury said his party would support a candidate with impeccable secular credentials who would uphold tenets of the Constitution and on whose name, maximum support can be garnered.
He said a decision on the issue could be arrived at in the next few days. Asked about BSP supporting a Dalit candidate, he said it would be too simplistic to come to that conclusion.
About the electoral college in case both SP and BSP did not support a UPA-Left candidate, the CPM leader said even in this scenario, the UPA-Left vote bank would have an edge over the NDA though the difference of votes would come down. However, he added that presidential election was not a poll to polarise the polity and there will be an effort to have the widest possible agreement on the name.
