No alliance other than with Sena in Maharashtra: Munde

Aurangabad, Maharashtra, June 20 (UNI) While reiterating that the BJP will not have an alliance with any other party than the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra, Senior party leader Gopinath Munde today ruled out the possibility of joining hands with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in the near future especially during the zilla parishad and panchayat elections.

Addressing a news conference here after attending the party's divisional meeting, Mr Munde said the BJP had supported the candidature of industrialist Rahul Bajaj for the Rajya Sabha elections because he was an independent candidate and emphasised that his party will have an alliance with the Sena for the Brihanmumbai Muncipal Corporation (BMC) elections.

''We (Sena-BJP) may fight against each other in some places in local self-bodies elections in case no alliance is arrived at, in the ZP and Panchayat elections, but would come together after the elections,'' Mr Munde said.

The former state Deputy Chief Minister came down heavily on the Democratic Front (DF) government for its failure on almost all fronts and not fulfilling the assurances given during the assembly elections.

He said the party's local units at various levels would launch an agitation soon to expose the government's failure on public issues such as farmers' suicides and loadshedding.

The BJP had already initiated protests programmes to expose the Centre's policy with the launch of party's agitation against the rising prices of essential commodities. The same would be intensified in various parts of the state soon, he said.

Mr Munde said the party had organised a divisional meeting here which was attended by the party's various office bearers in local self-bodies from the eight districts of Marathwada and four districts of North Maharashtra.

He said the party's organisational elections are scheduled to be held in October and, therefore, a membership drive has been undertaken in six places of the state.

The senior BJP leader said that the party has been receiving an encouraging response for its divisional meetings, with 80 per cent attendance by the representatives from Marathwada and North Maharashtra today.

To a question, Mr Munde said that though the party activists had lost their enthusiasm partially after the untimely death of Mr Pramod Mahajan, there would be major impact on the party's political performance in the days ahead.

The party has a history of such untimely deaths of its leaders like late Shayamaprasad Mukherjee and Deendayal Upadhyay in the past, he recalled, and said the party had continued its performance despite their deaths.

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