Hyderabad: The Congress is trying very hard to form a government at the centre with its UPA allies and keep the BJP out of power should the latter not get the required majority to form the government.
With four days left before the election results are announced, the Congress leadership is holding a series of meetings with the party's senior leaders.
UPA chairperson and former Congress president Sonia Gandhi has summoned all Congress Chief Ministers to Delhi. Meetings with senior Congressmen, general secretaries and those in charge of the party at state level will be held on May 22, a day before the Lok Sabha results are announced. On May 23, Ms Gandhi is holding a meeting with UPA allies and some other political parties.
In the May 22 meeting, the party will prepare a strategy to reach out to anti-BJP and neutral parties to get them into the UPA's fold. Ms Gandhi is likely to assign the party's senior leaders to do this job. The meeting will also discuss the strategy to be adopted in the May 23 meeting of the UPA and allied parties.
Former Prime Minister and JD(S) president, H D Deve Gowda, and his son, Karnataka Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy, have said that being a coalition partner of the Congress in Karnataka and having fought the Lok Sabha elections as its ally, their party would support any decision taken by the Congress to keep the BJP-led NDA alliance out of power.
Speaking to the media in Tirupati on Saturday, they said that it is not possible for regional parties to form the government at the Centre without the support of the Congress. There are many aspirants for prime ministership and a consensus has to be reached among them.
Mr Deve Gowda said that he will communicate his opinion to Ms Gandhi at the meeting of UPA allies on May 23.
Meanwhile, AICC general secretary and Telangana state Congress affairs in-charge R.C. Khuntia, who is currently in his home state Odisha, said that he would be in Delhi on May 20. He told this newspaper that he had no information about the meeting scheduled for May 22.
