Backward Mps Forum To Press For Narayanan As President

Members of the sceduled castes and scheduled tribes parliamentary forum plan to pass a resolution during the coming budget session to endorse the candidature of Vice President KR Narayanan for Presidency.

The next President is to be elected this summer and, if he is elected, Narayanan would be the first person from a scheduled caste to hold the office.

Such a resolution would be sure to strengthen Narayanans candidature.

Most political parties had told the forums leaders in 1992 that Narayanan would be elevated in 1997 but a forum leader said that some of them fear that a section of United Front leaders are pressing for a Muslim President. The forum wants to nip that idea in the bud, he said.

Railway minister Ram Vilas Paswan, a member of the forums executive committee, is reported to have pressed for the resolution. It is likely to be passed during the budget session.

Some members of the forum hold that the organisation should lobby vigorously, as it had when Narayanan became Vice President.

The country had two Presidents from the Muslim commuity, Zakir Hussain and Fakhruddin Ali Ahmad, he pointed out, but never a Dalit.

The forum, whose convenor is former Union minister G Venkatswamy, has 150 SC\ST MPs from various political parties as its members.