Mulayam meets Manmohan to discuss food scheme

Speculation rife Samajwadi Party might soften stance on programme

At a time when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is looking for ways to garner support for the Food Security Ordinance, Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Mulayam Singh Yadav met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday.

Yadav met Singh at his residence for about half-an-hour and left just before the Cabinet meeting began. The meeting aroused much curiosity because the SP is fiercely opposed to the food security scheme.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Yadav indicated he discussed his party's stand on the scheme with the prime minister. “When we meet the prime minister, it is obvious that there would be some discussion.”

Asked if the SP would withdraw support to the government, he said the issue was “irrelevant” as his party had opposed many initiatives of the UPA in the past as well.

However, while the SP had taken a contrarian view on several issues in the past, it supported the government in Parliament.

According to sources, Yadav’s party, which supports the UPA from outside, might soften its stance against the Ordinance if the SP-ruled Uttar Pradesh was given central benefits.

Last week, Yadav had attacked Congress over the Food Security Ordinance, accusing it of indulging in “vote bank politics” and said its intentions were not good.

He accused the Congress of bringing in the food Ordinance with the coming Lok Sabha elections in mind, the way it had brought in the rural employment scheme, MNREGA, before the previous polls.

Reacting to an Allahabad High Court ban on caste-based rallies, he said: “We welcome this judgment. The Samajwadi Party does not organise such rallies. We are not a caste-based party."

Asked about the Brahmin rallies organised by his party in Uttar Pradesh, he said, "I had gone to one such rally but did not go to the other. I am not in favour of such rallies."