D. Raja takes on Mulayam, questions Samajwadi Party's double standards

Communist Party of India (CPI) leader D. Raja on Monday took a jibe at Samajwadi Party (SP) supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav after he was critical of Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, and sought an explanation from him with regard to his party's continued support for the Congress-led UPA Government at the Centre.

"Mulayam Singh and his party are supporting the government. If they think the Prime Minister is so weak, why do they continue to support? It is for him to decide, take a stand vice-a-viz the government," Raja told Asian News International (ANI).

"We are not supporting the government. In fact, we are opposing the government, we are fighting the government; whereas Mulayam Singh Yadav and his party they are safeguarding the government and they are giving full support. On their support only, the government survives," he added.

Mulayam Singh Yadav earlier in the day dubbed the Prime Minister as a nice man with no independence to run his government the way he wanted to.

He asked that if the Prime Minister of the country did not have the independence to take decisions, how is it possible to run the country?

"If the Prime Minister shows that he is weak, then the country will be weak too," said Yadav.

The Samajwadi Party chief's comments about the Prime Minister comes at a time when Dr. Manmohan Singh's nine-year tenure at the helm of the UPA Government has come under sharp scrutiny, even from within the Congress.

The Samajwadi Party (SP) offers outside support to the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and is seen as a key support after two of its allies, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) pulled out of the ruling coalition.