NCP to break up with Congress?

NEW DELHI: Even as NCP rushed to deny news of a possible alliance with BJP, a newspaper report stating that Sharad Pawar had met with the latter's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi sparked off speculations in the political circles of a likely break-up with the UPA.

Adding to speculation, Praful Patel of NCP said that Congress has not given enough importance to an alliance with his party. "It's unfortunate that Congress has delayed talks in Maharashtra with NCP for too long," Patel said.

However Patel rubbished talks of a tie up wih BJP. "We are in an alliance with Congress and continue to do so. All this talk about an alliance with BJP is completely baseless," Patel said. "Political parties must be ready for all eventualities. Can't say options are closed. Wish to have alliance with Congress as before," he added.

On his part, NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Friday slammed as "completely mischievous" and "baseless" a media report about his meeting with Modi. "News of my meeting with Narendra Modi in New Delhi on January 17 appeared in a newspaper. (It) is completely mischievous, baseless & false," the Agriculture Minister said on micro-blogging site Twitter.

Pawar's tweets followed a front page report in a Marathi newspaper that the NCP chief is understood to have secretly met Modi in New Delhi on that day.

"During state visits or in Chief Ministers conferences in Delhi, I meet CM's and barring these occasions, never met Modi in the last one year," Pawar, whose party is the second largest constituent of the Congress-led UPA, said in another tweet.

Reacting to the news, BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said, "Allies know Congress can't deliver, hence they are looking for new partners." Captain Abhimanyu of BJP also denied any meeting. "Sharad Pawar ji has denied meeting Modi ji and the BJP also denies any such meeting taking place," he said.

The report claimed that the meeting had lasted nearly 30 minutes and that even senior leaders of the NCP and the BJP were not aware of it.

The meeting signals that the hands of the "clock" (symbol of NCP) is turning towards the "lotus" (symbol of BJP), the report had said.

NCP chief spokesperson D P Tripathi said, "Pawar was not even in Delhi on the day when the meeting was supposed to have taken place". NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik also dismissesed the news of a Modi-Pawar meet, saying that there is no question of an alliance with BJP.

NCP is in alliance with the Congress and sharing power in Maharashtra since 1999, months after Pawar parted ways with Congress on the issue of Sonia Gandhi's foreign origin.

NCP is part of the UPA at the Centre for the past 10 years.