Saturday, March 5 2005 11:01 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is unlikely to give any "outside support" to any non-Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) combine but wants to be part of any such coalition in Bihar, highly placed party sources said.

Having burnt its fingers extending "outside support" in different States, including to the Mayawati Government in Uttar Pradesh and the Chautala Government in Haryana, the party is not in a mood to repeat such "blunders" in Bihar, the sources said.

"Either we will be part of the Government or remain in Opposition," they said.

"Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) has got lesser number of seats than us but it is still expected of us to extend outside support. Why then should our MLAs be with us and not with Paswan or Janata Dal-United (JD-U)," a senior BJP leader said when asked about the possibility of the saffron party extending "outside support" to a RJD-JD-U alliance.

Besides, he said it would also send a wrong message to the party's allies that they can contest and win seats with the BJP but when it comes to Government formation, they can join with "anybody in the name of secularism" and take the party's support from outside.

As for Ram Vilas Paswan, he asked whether the LJP chief realised that the party was "communal" only after the post-Godhra violence. "He was part of the BJP-led Government after the 1992 demolition," the leader pointed out.