Not in running for PM's post: Mulayam

Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav Tuesday said he was not a candidate for prime ministership.

Interacting with local media persons at the Circuit House here, on the eve of his party's two-day national executive meeting, he also asserted that the government in New Delhi after the Lok Sabha polls will be formed by the Third Front.

The prime minister too would be decided only after the poll results, he said, also dismissing the possibility of Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi becoming the prime minister.

He said he was neither with the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) nor with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

Blaming "communal forces" for the Muzaffarnagar riots, he said it had now taken a casteist colour also. "That is the reason it (the violence) has spread to the rural areas."

Mulayam Singh expressed satisfaction at the response and the followup acts of the Akhilesh Yadav government in the state. "Within two days, the riots have been contained, and order restored."

On India-China relations, Mulayam Singh contended that China had a history of 5,000 years of deceit.

He noted that he had said in a Lok Sabha debate that India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had given the slogan of "Hindi-Chini, bhai-bhai" but had been dealt such a shock by the Chinese aggression in 1962 that it lead to his death in 1964.

"Whenever China is weak, it professes friendship but whenever it becomes strong, it practises deceit," he said.