Left threatens to ditch Gujral

The Left parties have threatened to desert the United Front government if three aides of Rashtriya Janata Dal president and Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav are not dropped from the I K Gujral ministry.

''We are not ready for any compromise on this issue. The Left parties cannot support the government if Gujral insists on keeping Laloo Yadav's RJD within the UF,'' Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet said.

The government's survival and support base will not be threatened if Laloo Yadav's supporters Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, Jai Narain Nishad and Kanti Singh are sacked from the ministry, he said.

''Retaining or removing ministers may be the prerogative of the prime minister. But only the UF steering committee can decide whether or not the RJD can be part of the coalition,'' claimed the CPI(M) general secretary.

Conceding that the internal power play in the Janata Dal has considerably tarnished the UF's image, he said, ''It is sad that we are forced to publicly confront the prime minister on the issue of corruption.''

Gujral has already announced that he is against sacking the ministers. ''This will spell deep trouble for him,'' said one UF insider.

The four Left parties -- the CPI(M), the Communist Party of India, the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Forward Block with a strength of 53 members of Parliament -- is the largest block of the coalition.

CPI national secretary D Raja said that his party is ''unhappy with the unexpected turn of events that the JD has brought into the UF government''. There is hardly any governance, he added.

Raja said the Left parties are unanimous that the prime minister should demand Laloo Yadav's resignation in view of the CBI's chargesheet against him in the fodder scam. ''We don't feel comfortable being part of a regime that welcomes corrupt leaders into its fold,'' he added.

The Left is also upset that Gujral is toeing Congress president Sitaram Kesri's line on a number of issues including the controversial Bofors scandal.

The Left parties suspect that the prime minister, under instructions from Kesri, is sitting on the CBI's Bofors report. The agency has sought the government's permission to prosecute the officials involved in the decade-old scandal.

In their fight against Gujral, the Left parties are supported by a sizeable section of Janata Dal leadership. JD president Sharad Yadav, former prime minister H D Deve Gowda and Union Railway Minister Ram Vilas Paswan have been pressurising Gujral to drop Laloo Yadav's RJD from the UF.