Meghalaya CM to share dais with Modi Saturday after political spat

Meghalaya Chief Minister Mukul Sangma, who had said Narendra Modi would never become the prime minister, would share the dais with him Saturday to flag off the first passenger train between Assam's Guwahati and his state's Garo Hills.

Sangma however made light of it.

"Sharing the dais with the prime minister is nothing extraordinary," Sangma said when journalists sought for his comments on his sharing the dais with Modi at Maligaon in Assam's main city of Guwahati.

In fact, Sangma and his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee are the only two chief ministers who has not met Modi after the Bharatiya Janata Party unseated the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government in the parliamentary elections.

However, the Meghalaya chief minister said that he would meet Modi only when it was needed.

"There has to be some specific reason to meet (the prime minister). When I need to meet, I will ask for an appointment. You do not have to read it from a different perspective because the chief minister has to meet the prime minister and the prime minister has to give an audience to the chief minister," he said.

"It is a question of not getting the right time. When I am free, the PM may not be free and be on tour."

Sangma, the veteran Congress leader from Meghalaya, had described Modi as a "fundamentalist" and claimed he will never become the prime minister of India because of his fundamentalist background, but Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will make it.

However, he said that the statement made by him against Modi were political remarks. "During the elections, political parties will have to pursue their own political ideology, principles, based on which you seek the support and mandate of the people," he said.