By IANS,
New Delhi : Senior Congress leader and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee Wednesday said that support from the Left parties for government formation would depend on the numbers game after the elections.
Asked if his party would accept Left support on the condition of him being prime minister Mukherjee told NDTV in an interview: “No, what would happen after the elections will depend on numbers.
“After all, ours is a multi-party system. Which political party holds how many seats in a vast electorate of more than 710 million voters, it is very difficult to make any assessment, precise assessment before the poll results are out and even two phases elections have not yet taken place,” Mukherjee maintained.
About re-looking the India-US civilian nuclear deal as a pre-condition by the Left for a post-poll aliance, Mukherjee said: “It is very difficult to say right now what will be the conditions. How can I predict what will be the conditions� what is to be re-looked….I am neither ruling out nor saying that it is possible. I am simply saying that I don’t know what do they want and what is to be re-looked.”
He also asserted that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) “is a terrorist organisation” and added that his government has been asking for the extradition of its chief, Velupillai Prabhakaran, every year.
Turning to the political equation in West Bengal, Mukherjee said he was confident of the Trinamool Congress’s support for forming a Congress-led government at the centre.
“I do not want to make any comment on any individual party’s future approach. But this much I have taken note of that, she (Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee) started distancing herself from NDA (National democratic Alliance) for quite some time. For instance, she did not support the (NDA) presidential and vice presidential candidates in 2007 July,” Mukherjee said.
“She did not join the bandwagon in July 2008 against the trust motion (in parliament) and when the seat adjustment was announced, she along with me stated on camera that in future she will support a secular, progressive, nationalist government at the centre. I have depended on that,” Mukherjee added.