Chandy meets Sonia, discusses political issues

New Delhi, July 17 (UNI) Former Kerala Chief Minister Oomen Chandy today met Congress President Sonia Gandhi and discussed organisational matters and the political situation in the state in the wake of the party losing power to the Marxist-led Left Democratic Front .

Mr Chandy did not disclose the details of the discussion he had with Ms Gandhi, but only said he had apprised her of the existing political situation in the state.

However, party sources said he had discussed the self-financing college issue on which the incumbent Achuthanandan government had taken a stand, opposite to the Congress stand.

Mr Chandy, who is also Leader of Opposition in the Kerala Assembly, had also discussed the issues relating to the Democratic Indira Congress, floated by former Congress veteran K Karunakaran, which had fought together with the Congress in the last assembly elections. However, the relationship between the DIC (K) and the Congress had strained in the wake of the defeat of the Congress-led front.

On the self-financing college issue, Mr Chandy said there was no change in the stand of the Congress-led UDF on this issue. However, the Opposition had supported the legislation, introduced by the new government, with a view to avoiding any problem for admission to students this year. We had reservation about the bill and we have aired our strong protest to certain provisions of the bill. However, we had supported the bill at the last stage by keeping in mind the future of students.

He said the Congress had been consistent in its stand that there must be social control on self financing colleges. At the same time, there must be a situation in which the private managements should raise resources to run such colleges.

Mr Chandy said the legislation passed by the present government could not be implemented.

He said the government was now saying that the new legislation should be included in the ninth schedule of the Constitution. But when the bill was discussed in the assembly, the government claimed that it had got expert opinion that it would stand legal scrutiny.

He said it would not be possible to give admission this year in self financing colleges, if the government wanted to include the new legislation in the ninth schedule of the constitution.

Mr Chandy said the only practical solution to the present impasse was to adopt the 50:50 formula proposed by the previous government.

The UDF government's stand was to reserve 50 per cent of the seats as merit quota and the remaining as management quota.

UNI SH VD RN1930