Next President Woman!

Next President Woman!


Indian Holocaust My Father`s Life and Time- One Hundred FORTY SIx


Palash Biswas


"Did anybody say action? I know what we should do - get our women cadre to show their backsides to this 'special' fact-finding team!" said an excited Benoy Konar, who despite his age still had the spring of a street urchin about him. He was famous for blowing hammer and sickle rings with his beedi smoke- a cool comrade at 75.

"I run the women's wing, you get Laxman's goons to do whatever they want" hissed Brinda, the bindi now a fiery red. She didn't like this old fogy stepping on her turf.

"Laxman's men had better watch out around Chairman Mao comrades! He still wears his spiked boots from the Long March", piped up someone in the room.

At this point Buddhadeb woke up with a jolt on his bed. The mobile phone was ringing loudly. He was sweating all over. Phew! What a nightmare it had been! From Marx to Mao in Nandigram indeed!
Buddha picked up the phone, "Salim, is that you?"
http://www.countercurrents.org/sagar010507.htm

Why not a woman President, asks CPI!

Somnath is emerging frontrunner for next President and RJD wants Jyoti Basu in raisina Hills!
How do we judge this statement of a vital Left Partner? Does CPI protest these two CPIM Big Brothers and playing a surgical politics using all fairness?

The Communist Party of India (CPI), undeterred by its ally CPI (M) denying a review of Left support to the UPA government, attacked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on two fronts on Saturday.

Party general secretary AB Bardhan said the PM has failed to "measure up" to Left’s expectations and would have to share his part of the blame for the anti-poor economic policies that the UPA seemed to be following. He was speaking in an interview on CNN/IBN’s "Devil's Advocate" programme on Saturday evening.

Earlier in the day, Bardhan had some scathing criticism in store for the National Knowledge Commission (NKC) – the prime minister’s brainchild – for its alleged pro-US slant and demanded a complete overhauling of the Commission.

In the interview, Bardhan said Singh "can't avoid the blame" for economic policies pursued by the government and accused Finance Minister P Chidambaram of "helping only a coterie." He said the PM was very much a part of the economic policies being implemented and asserted that both the Finance Minister and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia have Singh's blessings.


They have been fighting for reservation for women in Legislature. You know the result.
They have ensured ladies` quota in Panchayts and corporation, local bodies. The result you know. the male relatives enjoy the power! Legislature quota would mean greater control of Ruling classes in affairs relating lawmaking , all in the name of Woman`s Empowerment.

What is the Reality of Indian Society as far as the existance of woman is concerned? A Taslima Nasrin or a Prabha Khetan may answer best.
Would they like to have a lady like mahashweta Devi or Medha Patekar as the next President?
Or would they like an Ash, a Shilpa, a Mandira to be the wonderful showpiece in Rashtrapati Bahwan!

We have seen in Nandigram and singur! How the progressive Left treat Woman! And they now a Woman President! Have you read the news that Tigress Mamata bannerjeehas announced plans to parade outside Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s residence women who were allegedly raped by communist cadres in Nandigram!

Not Only this, on Saturday the constituency of Chief Minister Buddhadev witnessed how the Gestapo behaves with Women! Principal and Five teachers with more than tenstudents of Vivekanand Girls` School, Jadavpur, Kolkata were thrashed by CPIM cadres! The ladies were kept hostage for hours. The local committee leader of the party defines that it was a protest by the guardians!

Recent Studies on Indian Women: Empirical Work of Social Scientists
http://www.akhilbooks.com/frmsingleProductDet.aspx?id=11710

Singur Tapasi Malik(16 years) - Raped and burnt alive in Singur
Update: I found the picture of Tapasi Malik in better times.
I would like to credit http://taratv.com/ a popular
bengali TV channel for providing this picture on request.

Tapasi Malik 16 yrs - A strong willed girl and one of the youngest and most dedicated organisers in singur.

The CPM propoganda machinery has launched a massive disinformation
campaign claiming that Tapasi had committed suicide,
to cover up the crimes of it's lumpen cadre and Calcutta Gestapo Police.

It is extremely likely that even as I type this all the evidence is being
systematically destroyed to protect the perpetrators of this
henious crime despite Buddhadeb claiming that he will hand
the case over to the CBI for an impartial enquiry.
http://naxalrevolution.blogspot.com/2006/12/singur-tapasi-malik16-years-raped-and.html

Two Nandigram women allege rape by policemen

Press Trust of India
Posted online: Sunday, March 18, 2007 at 1508 hours IST


Nandigram, March 18: Two women have filed a formal complaint with police alleging that some of its personnel raped them during the Nandigram violence last week, police said on Sunday.


The two women, who are under treatment at the Tamluk hospital presently, have recorded their statement before a police officer, they said.

The victims, both housewives aged 27 years and 25 years, alleged that some police personnel cornered them during the melee after the firing at Sonachura village on March 14 and raped them.

The formal complaint was filed after they narrated their ordeal before a NDA delegation led by Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha L K Advani on Saturday

Kausar Bi killed, Gujarat govt tells SC

Kausar Bi, the wife of encounter victim Sohrabuddin Sheikh, met the same fate at the hands of the Gujarat Police.

On Monday, the Gujarat government submitted a report in a sealed cover to the Supreme Court, in which it is understood to have confirmed that Kausar Bi was killed a few days after Sohrabuddin’s encounter in November 2005 and her body was burnt to destroy the evidence.

Earlier, the state government had told the court that there was a "fair suspicion" that Kausar Bi too might have been killed.

Sources said the confirmation of her killing came during the interrogation of DG Vanzara, Gujarat DIG, Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS), Raj Kumar Pandian, SP (Intelligence), and MN Dinesh, SP, Alwar. The three officers were in police custody following their arrest in connection with the case.

As many as 122 witnesses had been examined so far and the investigators were trying to trace the remains of Kausar Bi’s body parts for DNA test to forensically prove the murder, the sources said, adding that more arrests were likely to follow.




Women Commission condemns Nandigram violence


KOLKATA, MAR 28 (PTI)
Condemning the "brutal" police action specially on the women at Nandigram on March 14, West Bengal Commission for Women today demanded exemplary punishment to the guilty and a compensation package for the victims and their families.

"We demand a compensation package for the victims and their families for the physical and mental trauma that they had to suffer," Commission Chairperson Jasodhara Bagchi said in a release here.

Noting that the Commission had already communicated its observation to the administration on March 15, Bagchi said it had also comndemned the suffering that had been caused to the women and children living in the camps at Tekhali and other places, where mostly CPI(M) cadres had taken refuge for over two months.

"Incidence of gang rape and murder that the residents of the camp and their families had faced, had reached the members of the Commission over the last month or so. The Commission members express their deep sorrow and anger at being actively obstructed from investigating these charges," the release said.

She said that all the victims, women and minors, "on both sides of the divide", should be given trauma counselling by professionals "whom we urgently request to come forward to help the victims".

The Women's Commission urged all conscientious forces to join hands in ensuring that the situation in Nandigram returns to normal.


Kisan Ki Malkiyat: A Way
Out Of The SEZ Impasse?

By Aseem Shrivastava

05 May, 2007
Countercurrents.org


“To build the SEZ, Reliance needs use of the land, not ownership of it.”
-Kisan Jagrukta Samiti (Farmer Awareness Association) poster, Jhajjar, Haryana

For those who live in Bharat, not India, development has always been a euphemism for war stretching across the half a dozen decades of “independence”. Tens of nameless millions have countenanced rude displacement from their homes and fields, officially unreckoned loss of livelihood, loss of customary access to water, forests, pastures, fisheries, the ruin of their traditions and culture, the breakdown of communities, and the devastation of a whole way of life rooted in the centuries. In exchange for these gifts to urbanized “modernity” they have had to accept the fate of peons, cleaners, sweepers, even beggars in the cities that have mushroomed on the graves of their past. This is the sort of de facto employment that has come their way in lieu of the secure livelihood that they customarily had. And women have borne the brunt of the burden of adjustment.

Because we in the cities claim to know better.
http://www.countercurrents.org/aseem050507.htm

Indian woman locked in a room for 15 years by family

Police in India's eastern state of West Bengal have rescued a 40-year-old-woman who was imprisoned by her husband and in-laws in a cramped room for 15 years because she did not get enough dowry, a newspaper reported Sunday. Police found Madhabi Das inside a room at her in-laws' residence in Baruipur district near the state capital Kolkata on Saturday, and said the woman had lost her sanity because of the long detention, the Times of India reported.

Investigators said the woman had spent her youth inside a small and dark room as her in-laws and husband started demanding a huge dowry soon after her marriage.

Police have meanwhile detained three members of her family including her mother-in-law and husband and sent Das to a mental asylum for treatment.

Dowry is exchanged in a majority of Indian weddings though its practice became illegal in 1961. According to a UN report, 70 per cent of married women in India face domestic violence and many of such cases are dowry-related.

Women are abused, beaten and even killed for not getting enough dowry. The government's National Crime Records Bureau reports that more than 18 women are killed for dowry in India every day.


THE POLAVARAM PROJECT
Less than half a voice
Among those whose livelihoods will be displaced by the Indira Sagar dam, women far outnumber men. But there is virtually no voice representing women's views, whether for or against the project, in all the talk of displacement here. Instead, nearly all their choices are handed down to them. R Uma Maheshwari reports.
http://www.indiatogether.org/2006/sep/wom-polwomen.htm

When a Kiss Is More Than a Kiss
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/weekinreview/06vitello.html?ref=world

By PAUL VITELLO
Published: May 6, 2007
RICHARD GERE, while not the first person you’d think most likely to invoke the wrath of a conservative religious mob by kissing somebody in public, was at least a passably recognizable symbolic target for Hindu demonstrators last week, when they burned his figure in effigy in cities across India.

If not a wavy-haired, pretty-faced, prostitute-patronizer-portraying American actor, then who are religious firebrands supposed to burn in effigy when a man violates a cultural taboo by kissing a woman in public, as Mr. Gere did? (He planted several lingering kisses on the neck of an Indian actress, Shilpa Shetty, at a televised charity event in Mumbai.)

Surely not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

But think again. When Mr. Ahmadinejad, the ultraconservative president of Iran, kissed the gloved hand last week of an elderly woman who had once been his school teacher, at a ceremony for a national teachers’ day, he, too, received sharp rebukes from clerics.

Islamic religious leaders accused him of “indecency.” Islamic newspapers noted that under Shariah law contact with a woman with whom one is not related is a crime sometimes punishable by death.

Mr. Gere apologized to those he had offended.

Mr. Ahmadinejad did not. (And left town instead for a scheduled visit with the pope.)

But anthropologists and philematologists (people who study kissing) say the harsh reactions to Mr. Ahmadinejad’s and Mr. Gere’s kisses underline a certain cultural and political mystery about the seemingly simple act of kissing.


Is it STILL trouble for Indian Women?
The expression "eve teasing" is Indian in origin; you won't find it in most
dictionaries. Native speakers of English don't use it.

Eve teasing is a euphemistic expression that lives in post-colonial India and refers largely to sexual harassment of women in public spaces, thereby constituting women as ‘eves’, temptresses who provoke men into states of sexual titillation. This popular perception of sexual harassment posits the phenomena as a joke where women are both a tease and deserve to be teased. Considered a growing problem throughout the subcontinent, eve teasing ranges in severity from sexually-coloured remarks to outright groping.
Source: Sexual harassment. Pratiksha Baxi

It’s the same story everyday.
http://www.thesouthasian.org/archives/2004/is_it_still_trouble_for_indian.html

Indian Woman-power on Show at June Conference

New Delhi, May 5: Over 2000 women, 40 countries and a single aim - empowerment of women across the globe. This is precisely what the International Women’s Conference 2007 (June 8-10) by the Art of Living Foundation aims to accomplish by bringing together urban and rural women from different parts of the world.

Among them are some of the most influential political, social and artistic achievers from India, including Kiran Bedi, Renuka Chowdhary, Sheila Dixit, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Hema Malini, Sharmila Tagore, Dia Mirza, Lara Dutta and Soha Ali Khan.

Says danseuse/actor Hema Malini, who will be performing at the conference on June 8, “When political leaders and celebrities come together for a conference like this, which has spirituality as its foundation, a lot can be done to eradiate grave women’s issues.”

One of the key aims will be to bridge the gap between highly successful and underprivileged women in India. “In times such as these when women world over are excelling in and commandeering fields normally reserved for men, atrocities are also at an all-time high. A conference like this will be an eye opener,” says Lara Dutta.

Adds chairperson Bhanumati Narsimhan, "This meet will enable women to share their insights and find ways of supporting each other.”

Sums up Kiran Bedi, “We must always ask ourselves whether we could be more compassionate and giving in everything we do for things to improvise.”


Sexy toys for sexy gals
Varuna Verma discovers that urban women are taking to sex gadgets like never before

Aarthi Shetty (name changed) was looking forward to becoming richer by some Estee Lauder perfumes when her husband returned from a three-month work stint in Hong Kong. But Shetty’s otherwise-predictable software professional husband had a surprise in store for her. “He bought me a vibrator,” says Bangalore-based Shetty.

The vibrator and penile ring added a new zing to the Shettys’ sex life. “We began experimenting in bed. And now, whenever my husband is travelling, I can always fall back on the vibrator,” says Shetty. Adds Sharmishtha, a PR executive in Calcutta, “My husband and I exchange such gifts just for fun.”

When Shetty boasted to her friends about her new bedroom buy, she learnt that she was in no way a pioneer. Most of her friends were veteran vibrator users.

Clearly, a sex toy is no longer such an unthinkable element of urban Indian bedrooms — and especially not for women. “Indians are finding sex gadgets a fun way to bring excitement into their love life,” says Prakash Kothari, a Mumbai-based sexologist. He claims 30 per cent of his clients use sex toys.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070506/asp/7days/story_7739751.asp
How multiculturalism is betraying women

Do you believe in the rights of women, or do you believe in multiculturalism? A series of verdicts in the German courts in the past month, have shown with hot, hard logic that you can’t back both. You have to choose.
The crux case centres on a woman called Nishal, a 26-year-old Moroccan immigrant to Germany with two kids and a psychotic husband. Since their wedding night, this husband beat the hell out of her. She crawled to the police covered in wounds, and they ordered the husband to stay away from her. He refused. He terrorised her with death threats.
So Nishal went to the courts to request an early divorce, hoping that once they were no longer married he would leave her alone. A judge who believed in the rights of women would find it very easy to make a judgement: you’re free from this man, case dismissed.
But Judge Christa Datz -Winter followed the logic of multiculturalism instead. She said she would not grant an early divorce because - despite the police documentation of extreme violence and continued threats - there was no “unreasonable hardship” here.
Why? Because the woman, as a Muslim, should have “expected” it, the judge explained. She read out passages from the Koran to show that Muslim husbands have the “right to use corporal punishment”. Look at Sura 4, verse 34, she said to Nishal, where the Koran says he can hammer you. That’s your culture. Goodbye, and enjoy your beatings.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=4&theme=&usrsess=1&id=155516


And See!

http://sify.com/news_info/news/imagegallery/gallery/index.php?hcategory=13733685
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/ipeterso/as220/220syl.html
https://www.vedamsbooks.com/no27027.htm

Yatra is a trip to nowhere
http://www.rediff.com/movies/2007/may/04yatra.htm

Calcutta and its fringes will have 30 to 35 new malls or retail formats of various sizes in the next 36 months. They add up to 10 million sq ft of shop-floor space, says Abhijit Das, regional director of Trammell Crow Meghraj Property Consultants. Going by the thumb-rule of one person per 300 sq ft of retail space, we are looking at close to 35,000 new retail jobs in Calcutta by 2010, including in sales on the shop-floor, operations, logistics, facilities and supervisory and managerial capacities. Do we have a large enough resource pool?
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070506/asp/calcutta/story_7731355.asp

India’s righteousness junkies
A new breed of vigilantes is pouncing upon perceived public insults or obscenity. Velly Thevar, Anirban Das Mahapatra and V. Kumara Swamy look at what makes these people tick
Pity poor Mandira Bedi. First, India crashed out of the Cricket World Cup, leaving millions of Indians dejected and not really interested in her sexy sideshow of big hair and spangled outfits. And then, when she donned a sari emblazoned with flags of... | Read..
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070506/asp/7days/story_7738352.asp


Scene one: new Delhi
The world's largest passenger aircraft A-380 touched down for the first time in India on Sunday to mark the second anniversary celebrations of Kingfisher Airlines.

This fully double-decker aircraft, which landed at 10.50 am, has a passenger capacity of 850 seats in all economy configurations, but in three classes it has the capacity to carry about 550 passengers.Kingfisher Airlines has ordered five A-380 planes, which has a list price of over $300 million per aircraft.

The super jumbo aircraft is powered by four Trent engines manufactured by Rolls Royce and can fly 15,000 km non-stop.

During its India visit, it would be taking some VIPs on a flight of fancy over Delhi, and on Tuesday it will fly off to Mumbai.

Scene Two: Kolkata

An over-enthusiastic teenage girl caused a flutter by breaching the security cordon and passionately embraced cricket heart-throb Mahendra Singh Dhoni on the final day of the Indian team's conditioning camp.The incident occurred at the Eden Gardens after the team had wrapped up its final practice session and when the players were boarding the team bus on their way back to the hotel rooms. The ardent fan, identified as Siuli Hasina Nasrin, managed to squeeze through the tight security and ran towards the team bus with a autograph card in hand, pleading the cricketer to sign it. Dhoni, who was already inside the bus by then, came out to oblige the 19-year-old.

Nasrin, a first year student from Berhampore in Murshidabad district, had been camping here for the past four days, perhaps with the sole intention of meeting her hero. And Dhoni probably thought that the girl deserved to be given his autograph.

A B Bardhan, general secretary of the Communist Party of India, said that if there was a demand from political parties and the media, his party would favour a woman as the presidential candidate.
He was talking to rediff.com on Sunday afternoon in New Delhi at a specially convened press conference to release four books -- two of them on the 1857 Uprising.

He ducked the question when asked who in his opinion would be more suitable as candidate for the Presidentship -- former West Bengal chief minister Jyoti Basu or Somnath Chatterjee, speaker of Lok Sabha.


President A P J Kalam's tenure comes to an end on July 2007. Though there are have been suggestions that Kalam should be given a second term in office, names of likely successors have been doing the rounds as well.One such name is that of Infosys chief mentor and non-executive chairman N R Narayana Murthy.

Even President Kalam, while interacting with trainees at the Infosys' Global Education Centre in Mysore on Sunday, acknowledged that Murthy's appointment to the top post would be 'fantastic.'

"Yes, we haven't had a woman President and this could certainly be considered by our party," he said.He denied that the Left parties were against second tenure to be given to President A P J Abdul Kalam because he represented a certain section of the Indian society.

"Is he the sole repository of the miniorities? Before him we had Dr Zakir Hussain, Dr Fakhrudddin Ali Ahmed. We have never opposed second term to him vehemntly," Bardhan said.

It is no secret that Bardhan has been firing shots in this matter on behalf of the Left parties so that a situation could be created whereby the candidate from the Left becomes acceptable to all parties.

"We have not even thought about the candidature for the post of this august office. We will discuss the names only after UP Assembly results," he said.

According to sources, the Left parties will not put up a candidate unless they are sure that they are in a position to win.

Last time they put up a candidate against Kalam and lost badly.

And who will be the next President?
http://newstodaynet.com/guest/0205gu1.htm

M V KAMATH

In a few more months, Dr A P J Abdul Kalam would have completed his term as President of India. He has not shown much interest in seeking a second term; at least not openly. It wouldn't have been his style, anyway. On the other hand he has expressed a desire to return to his first love, teaching. He may genuinely wish to step down; it is also possible that he has been given a hint by the Congress-led UPA government that it would be happy if he steps down. If a nation-wide poll is taken on who should be the next President, in all likelihood Dr Kalam will win hands down. He has said nothing that could even be remotely considered as offensive or out of touch with life. He has played the game well. His stature as a scientist has stood him in good stead and has, indeed grown.

And should he leave, he would be considered to be among the best of the lot.

But who would replace him? Speculation has already begun. And the question is also asked: Shouldn't we elect a woman as President, 60 years after we achieved independence? There is no reason why we shouldn't. If we could have a woman as Prime Minister, why should anything inhibit us from electing a woman as the President as well? But where are the candidates?

The Sunday Express (15 April) invited several well-known citizens to state their views but their inputs are hardly encouraging. Prahlad Kakkar, the ad man thinks that 'someone like Mrinalini Sarabhai' would not be a bad choice, but never Uma Bharti who, according to him is 'like a man masquerading as a woman' - a comment in very poor taste. He would prefer 'someone graceful and pleasing to the eyes - a good-looking woman - who knows table manners.' If that is not hilarious, what is?

According to Jaya Jaitley 'in a scenario where people don't want women entering Parliament, having a woman as our President will be nothing more than tokenism.' For all that she has 'someone like Mahashweta Devi' in mind for the post.



Sunday, 06 May , 2007, 17:41

New Delhi: Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee is emerging as a frontrunner for the post of the next president of India despite formal denial by his office that he was a candidate.



Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) insiders however say they have no one except Chatterjee in mind when they discuss the possibility of the party pitching in for him for the job of first citizen of the country.

The party also seemed prepared to return the post of Lok Sabha speaker to the Congress party and also push for a Congress candidate for the post of vice president in the event of a general consensus in the UPA-Left combine on Chatterjee.

Also read: Kalam remains BJP’s first choice as next President | In pics: Who will be the next President?

However, when a TV news channel last week carried a news item saying Chatterjee was "in the race for Rashtrapati Bhavan", he took strong exception to it and said "don't reduce it to a matter of media speculation."

In reply to another question he had said, "I have not discussed it (presidential elections) with anybody nor has anybody discussed it with me."

As the seven-phase Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections are drawing to an end, the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and its supporting Left partners have started looking at presidential elections to be held in July.

Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh told newsmen here Saturday that his party would support a presidential candidate set up by the Left parties. He, however, clarified this support is only for a Left candidate and not a Left-supported Congress candidate.

Communist Party of India (CPI) general secretary A B Bardhan was more categorical. In an interview on TV channel CNN-IBN on Sunday, he said he would welcome Chatterjee as president, but would not propose his name for the post.

He too clarified that the Left Front would not support President A P J Abdul Kalam for a second term or Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat for the post of president.

Meanwhile, reports suggest that some discussions on this issue reportedly took place both within the CPI-M and Congress last week.

Sources in the CPI-M mentioned that a meeting of the central committee of the party for this purpose was held last week. But a final view was put off till the Uttar Pradesh election results were declared. "No names were discussed," the sources said.

A major point of discussion at the central committee meeting of the CPI-M was the composition of an electoral college. "A lot depends on the outcome of Uttar Pradesh assembly polls," said a party insider.

The CPI-M's calculation is that the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) may not have the numbers to win the presidential elections, even with its National Democratic Alliance (NDA) allies.

According to a CPI-M leader, the party is keen to draw the BJP into a contest - a view shared by the Congress - because "it will be a very good opportunity to see who stands where".

In the Congress, members of the core committee including party president Sonia Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Human Resources Development Minister Arjun Singh, Defence Minister A.K. Antony and Sonia Gandhi's political secretary Ahmed Patel reportedly met sometime back and deliberated on this issue.

According to Congress's calculations, the UPA-Left combine has a clear lead over the NDA alliance with a surplus of 80,000 votes in the electoral college for the presidential elections, excluding the Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party, perceived as neutrals by the two major combines.

The prospect of approaching smaller parties outside the UPA, like former prime minister H D Deve Gowda's Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) and erstwhile UPA partner Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) to further consolidate UPA flanks, also came up during the discussions in the Congress.

Kalam remains BJP’s first choice as next President

Monday, 30 April , 2007, 20:36

New Delhi: President A P J Abdul Kalam remains the main opposition BJP's first choice for the top office despite the CPI-M coming out openly against a second term for the incumbent.

BJP leaders refuse to say it openly at this juncture, but make known their preference privately for fears any public comment from the saffron party could harm his chances.

"As of now there is almost unanimity in the BJP that he (Kalam) should be re-elected," a senior BJP leader, who did not want to be named, said.



Top BJP leaders Atal Bihari Vajpayee, L K Advani and Rajnath Singh had driven down to Rashtrapati Bhavan last year for an unscheduled meeting where they said to have tried to persuade Kalam to agree for a re-election bid.

"We would not like to say anything officially and in public now as it would give our rivals a chance to portray him as BJP candidate," the leader said.

Its reluctance to come out openly in support of Kalam is also because Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat is understood to be keen for elevation to the highest office.

The opposition is banking heavily on the results of Uttar Pradesh elections, which it feels could become a determining factor in election of the next President.

"Kalam is our first choice. If it does not materialise, then we have Shekhawat," the leader said.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister P R Dasmunsi, when asked at a news conference the stand of the UPA in view of the CPI-M's opposition to Kalam's second term, steered clear of the issue. "It is for the party to decide. Whoever is made the official candidate, I will be the chief election agent," he said.

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