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Former minister sees

Rao rout in Indian state

MADRAS: A former Indian minister who recently resigned in protest said on Tuesday that Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao's Congress party would be routed in a key southern state in coming general elections.

P. Chidambaram, who quit in protest last week as commerce minister, told Reuters that his rebel Congress faction and its regional ally would win at least 32 of 39 races for the federal parliament in Tamil Nadu state.

Chidambaram, in Tamil Nadu's capital Madras on a day-long break from campaigning in his rural constituency of Sivaganga, said Congress's decision to expel him would not sideline him from politics or end his efforts to open up the economy.

Congress expelled Chidambaram, nine other members of the lower house (Lok Sabha) and 19 members of the Tamil Nadu state assembly after they decided to fight the elections under a new banner in Tamil Nadu.

They had strongly resisted Congress's efforts to renew an electoral pact with Tamil Nadu's governing party, the AIADMK.

"For three years the Congress party here has taken a position against the AIADMK on the grounds of corruption, mal-administration, violence (and) fascist tendencies," Chidambaram said.

He said virtually every Congress party worker opposed the re-election of the AIADMK, headed by Tamil Nadu chief minister J. Jayalalitha. State assembly polls will be held at the same time as parliamentary elections, which start on April 27.

Chidambaram said he would have preferred Congress to fight on its own in Tamil Nadu but the Congress leadership in New Delhi did not support that option. His renegade faction tied up with the opposition DMK party after its leader M. Karunanidhi extended a hand.

The former commerce minister predicted 65 to 75 percent of Tamil Nadu's electorate would reject the AIADMK, allowing the Congress rebels and the DMK to sweep the assembly polls.

"And if that happens, the same result will be reflected in the parliament polls also. Out of 39 seats in Tamil Nadu, our alliance should win not less than 32 or 33," he said.

Congress and its AIADMK ally took all 39 Lok Sabha seats from Tamil Nadu in the 1991 elections, helping the party establish a strong base in the south.

Asked if his expectation that the mainstream Congress party would be soundly defeated in Tamil Nadu meant it would be difficult for Rao to form the next federal government, Chidambaram said it was too early to tell.

Tamil Nadu accounts for about seven percent of the 545 seats in the lower house.

Chidambaram said he was not concerned by longstanding charges that the DMK, which ruled the state from 1967 to 1976 and again from 1989 to 1991, had close ties to LTTE separatist guerrillas fighting against the Sri Lankan government.

"We are dealing with issues of 1996, not issues of circa 1991 or circa 1989. Besides the DMK has distanced itself from the LTTE," Chidambaram said.-Reuter