Mulayam hopeful of renewing ties with Left

Hoping for a reconciliation with the Left, SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav on Saturday  said his party had committed a mistake by supporting the UPA-I after the Communists withdrew support on the nuclear deal issue.

Yadav, who is trying to regain the lost bonhomie with the Left by joining the nationwide strike by 13 parties on April 27 against price rise, said that deliberations with the Left in this regard would be held after the stir.

Asked whether the strike call would bring Samajwadi Party closer to the Left, Yadav said he had raised the matter at a meeting of parties in Delhi earlier this month. "They (Left) agreed on it and said that talks in this regard would be held after April 27," he told reporters.

On differences between the two sides, Yadav said, "Not only they, we too had committed a mistake... what was the need to extend support to the UPA government when the Left had parted ways with it".

On the phone tapping issue, the SP president said that it would be raised in Parliament as it was a "violation of the fundamental rights".

He claimed that it was the efforts of Lalu Prasad Yadav and Sharad Yadav besides himself that forced the government to give an assurance for a probe in the IPL controversy in the Lok Sabha.

"All the issues would be taken up in the probe and we would also demand tabling of the report in the House," Yadav said, evading a reply to whether he would demand resignation of the union ministers allegedly involved in the controversy.

To a question on CBI informing the Superme Court that it would consider closure of the disproportionate assets case against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati, he said that "all were aware as to why I am being framed and why Mayawati is being let off".

The SP chief appealed to the people of the state including intellectuals and traders to make the strike successful, saying that it would highlight the plight of the common people who were reeling under inflation.

Attacking Uttar Pradesh government, Yadav said that if the union government was responsible for framing wrong policies, the state governments were responsible for the failure of the public distribution system. The Left had warmed up to the SP's arch-rival BSP in the aftermath of the nuclear deal issue in 2008 but Mayawati's party has decided to stay away from the April 27 strike.