NCP asks Nitish to take call on ties with NDA in wake of Modi's new role

Observing that Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi's projection as the BJP's national face in the run up to the next general election was a "near certainty", the NCP today asked Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to take a call on his party JD(U)'s association with the BJP-led NDA.

"It is time that Kumar must take a call on continuing ties with the BJP-led NDA amid near certainty that Modi will be the saffron party's national face in the run up to the next general elections," NCP national general secretary Tariq Anwar told reporters.

"Time has come for the Bihar Chief Minister to deliver on his promise to severe ties with the BJP and NDA if his Gujarat counterpart is projected as BJP's prime ministerial candidate," he said referring to the latter's rising graph in the main opposition ranks.

The people of Bihar looked upto Kumar to clear the air about his party's association with the BJP vis-a-vis Modi's projection as a national leader by the BJP leadership, Anwar said and extorted the former to take a call at the earliest to live upto his credentials as a secular leader. The NCP leader said that the Telegu Desham Party (TDP) chief N. Chandrababu Naidu too was faced with similar predicament and he should also make his position clear about association with the BJP.

Anwar, who is the Minister of State for Agriculture in the UPA government, claimed there was "desperation" in BJP to project Modi as its national face ahead of the next general elections as there was shortage of natinonal leaders in the party. "Modi has never been a player in national politics nor he has a pan-India image and yet the BJP was striving hard to brand him as the national leader despite its impact on stability of the NDA", he said.

The senior NCP leader said that the BJP was "desperate for power at the centre at all costs and has thrown its last dice in Modi to win popular votes, but it has misunderstood resilience of the secular people who will unitedly defeat the communal forces."