Pawar snubs, State NCP resolves to back Sangma

BHUBANESWAR / NEW DELHI: Despite a snub to P A Sangma by party supremo Sharad Pawar, the Odisha unit of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) has decided to back Sangma in the presidential race.“We will support Sangma come what may, let the national unit go with the UPA,” NCP Legislature Party leader Amar Prasad Satpathy told this paper on Friday. Such a decision, he explained, has been taken in the Odisha context. In the State, the NCP had seat-sharing arrangement with the BJD and fought against the Congress in the 2009 elections.The decision to support Sangma was taken at an emergency meeting of the legislature party held here on Friday that cannot be reversed now. The decision has already been intimated to the national leadership, Satpathy said. The NCP has 4 MLAs in the Assembly.On Thursday, chief ministers Naveen Patnaik and J Jayalalithaa had announced the name of Sangma as the presidential candidate. Jaya, in fact, on Friday  appealed to all the parties to rise above political considerations and back Sangma.Referring to the statement of party general secretary D P Tripathy, Satpathy said the Odisha unit, which is a supporting party of the BJD, will go with the decision taken by Naveen. As Naveen has announced support for the NCP leader, the State unit will support him, he said, adding, “let the central unit of the party go with the UPA.”Meanwhile, support for Sangma has come from the NCP unit of Jammu and Kashmir, which has appealed to all political parties to unanimously back Sangma in the presidential race.Sangma, meanwhile, had a meeting with Pawar. Sangma said Pawar had explained to him that the NCP is part of the UPA and his (Pawar’s) stand on the issue will be in consistent with it. However, Pawar told Sangma that they (UPA) would discuss all suggestions given by him, especially his demand for a tribal candidate for the top post.Asked whether Pawar had been miffed by the fact that he had garnered support for himself at his  individual level without getting endorsement from his party, Sangma said, “Nothing of that sort happened. He knows I am in an association (of tribal communities of India) and what we are trying to achieve.”Pawar’s party is a key ally of the Congress-led UPA at the Centre since May 2004 and the two parties are also sharing power in Maharashtra since 2009.