New Delhi, May 12
With the value of votes in a Presidential election having crystallised following the outcome of the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh yesterday, the Congress-led UPA and the Left parties supporting the Manmohan Singh government from outside can get their nominee ensconced in the Rashtrapati Bhawan without any hiccup.

With BSP’s Mayawati having secured a clear majority without having to look beyond her party to form the government in Lucknow, the decks have been cleared to begin discussions in striving for a consensus candidate to succeed President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, who completes his five-year term in July.

The BJP’s poor showing at the hustings in Uttar Pradesh has delivered the party a severe body blow and brought down its value of votes in the electoral college of the two Houses of Parliament and the state legislative assemblies thereby adversely affecting the prospects of the NDA in the Presidential stakes.

Mayawati’s calculated strategy of striving for inclusiveness beyond the Dalits has provided the much needed shot in the arm to not only the Left but also the UPA as it is for the first time in nearly 15 years that a single party government will take the reigns of power in Uttar Pradesh.

Mayawati herself is yet to disclose her mind about what she has up her sleeve regarding her choice for the highest constitutional office in the country.

Meanwhile, the CPM has fired the first salvo stressing that the UPA-Left combine has a definitive edge in the ensuing Presidential poll with the BSP winning a majority in the UP Assembly. At the same, the party was quick to observe that the BSP might not necessarily support a Dalit nominee. Considering the success she has achieved with social engineering, it might not be surprising if Mayawati opts to break ranks by proposing a non-Dalit or even an upper caste person.

CPM Politburo member Sitaram Yechuri told mediapersons here today that the decks had been cleared for a UPA-Left candidate for the Presidential poll. Releasing the party’s special issues of “People’s Democracy” and “Lok Lehar” in English and Hindi, respectively, Yechuri hoped that the BSP and the Samajwadi party would also support the efforts to choose the next President through consensus. He was confident they would also like to be part of the exercise to elect a President who had an impeccable secular credentials. Even though somewhat premature, he felt other regional parties would also like to be associated with such an exercise.

Clearly, the support of the BSP and the SP or either of them would be an added advantage to getting a nominee of the UPA-Left enter the erstwhile Viceregal Lodge on the Raisina hill. Yechuri reeled off statistics by giving the value of votes of the Congress and its allies as well as the Left parties to underline his contention compared to the value of votes of the NDA.

Yechuri steered clear of indicating if the CPM had a candidate in mind for the President’s post except to say that the nominee would be a consensual one.

Asked if the candidate could be someone other than those whose names are doing the rounds like that of external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee, union power minister Sushil Kumar Shinde or ICCR chairman Karan Singh, Yechuri said “yes, it could be...”

He said the Left could support a Congress nominee as it had done in @the past in the case of Shankar Dayal Sharma and K.R. Narayanan. He, however, cautioned that the question was not of a particular candidate or any particular party.

There is discernible circumspection in the UPA and the Left about Mayawati and they would rather wait and watch rather than push matters. Significantly both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi telephoned Mayawati yesterday and congratulated her for the singular electoral triumph. The total value of votes in Parliament and state assemblies is as follows: Lok Sabha - 384,490; Rajya Sabha - 164,984; state assemblies - 549,474.