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Ram Vilas Paswan resigns from party posts

The six-member Janata Dal in the Lok Sabha faced a crisis of sorts today after its parliamentary board chairman Ram Vilas Paswan resigned from party posts protesting against the party's decision to oppose President's rule in Bihar.

Paswan said he would support the government's resolution to impose President's rule and regretted that his party had failed to evolve a consensus on the Bihar issue.

Paswan has also quit as party leader in the Lok Sabha stating that support to the Rashtriya Janata Dal, which was fighting to restore the Rabri Devi government, would only strengthen the Bharatiya Janata Party. The latter would cash in on resentment building up against Laloo over the issue of corruption and misrule, he said.

He claimed the entire Bihar state Janata Dal unit was with him in wanting the removal of the Rabri Devi government. State JD President Ram Jiwan Singh and Vice-President Pashupati Nath Paras were also present at the press conference.

Earlier in the day, Janata Dal President Sharad Yadav admitted after a meeting with former prime minister H D Deve Gowda and Karnataka Chief Minister J H Patel that there were 'differences' among party leaders and that the party was yet to decide whether or not to support the Centre's decision.

Karnataka Chief Minister J H Patel said the party had always opposed imposition of President's rule and that the state assembly should be the place the majority should be tested, barring a grave situation that undermined national interests. There was scope for dissent in the party since it was the 'most democratic' party in the country, Patel said.

Paswan said his stand should not be construed as support to the BJP since he opposed the BJP at the national level as much as he was opposed to the corruption, bad administration and non-governance of the RJD government in Bihar.

He refused to comment on the Congress's decision to oppose the ratification but said those who wanted to overthrow the Vajpayee government which was controlled by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, should bring a no-confidence motion against it. But he did ask why the Congress had sought a circuitous route of fighting the BJP-led government's communalism by opposing the ratification in Parliament, he asked.

Paswan said he had not resigned from the party but had quit his party post to register his protest against the killings of Dalits in Bihar.

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