New Delhi: Despite the Samajwadi Party unilaterally announcing candidates in over half of the seats in Uttar Pradesh, a senior Congress leader from the state today hoped that an alliance with it was still possible and wanted the SP to understand the "difficulties" of Congress.
"Both the Congress and SP need to work together in Uttar Pradesh. The SP should understand our difficulties and learn working in coordination," ex-UPCC chief Salman Khurshid said.
Admitting that the Mulayam Singh Yadav-led party was in an advantageous position in the state, he said his party must accept this reality.
Despite the SP announcing its candidates for 46 seats in the state, which is more than half of the total 80 parliamentary constituencies, Khurshid still hoped that the two parties would soon reach a pre-poll understanding.
"Negotiation is an art of making difficult things possible. I hope we would reach an electoral understanding soon, which would benefit both the parties," said Khurshid, who was not long ago known to be a harsh critic of SP and its leaders Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh.
He said when two parties have agreed to contest elections jointly, any decision regarding the candidates should be taken in consensus.
Asked whether his party would support the candidature of Sanjay Dutt, who has been nominated as SP candidate from Lucknow, Khurshid only said, "Sanjay Dutt is a good man. Our party has long been supporting him and his family. His father was a long-time member of Congress and his sister Priya Dutt is a sitting MP of the party."
The two parties are still in negotiation over seat-sharing in the politically crucial state with both staking claims in many constituencies.
