Akalis for N-deal, but will vote against govt

NEW DELHI: Coming to terms with political realities, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) has said that there is no contradiction in its supporting the nuclear deal but opposing the UPA government during a trust vote in Parliament.

The second part of the party\'s stand - that it would oppose the government - came on Thursday, perhaps after a careful review of its earlier support to the deal, which was also construed as the party\'s eight Lok Sabha members abstaining or even voting for the government.

\"The deal is good because the country is facing an energy crisis. In Punjab, for instance, we cannot give six hours of electricity to the farmers every day. Industries in the state are getting closed,\" SAD parliamentary party leader Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa said.

\"But that does not mean that we have forgotten what the Congress has done to the Sikhs. We will definitely vote against the government during a trust vote,\" he said, adding that a formal decision would be taken on July 15 after the meeting of the party\'s apex body. SAD, a religio-political party, draws inspiration from the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabhandhak Committee (SGPC).

The Akali leader said as an independent political party, SAD was free to have an independent view on the nuclear deal even if it was a part of NDA. He said their support for the deal had nothing to do with the Prime Minister being a Sikh. \"The PM is a Sikh but he belongs to the Congress. We can never forgive the Congress for what it has done to the Sikhs. The PM\'s apology for 1984 does not make a difference to our position,\" Dhindsa clarified.

Reminded that Shiv Sena, also a part of NDA, had favoured Pratibha Patil as President because she is a Maharashtrian, the Akali leader said that \"Maharashtirans never underwent anything like the Sikhs\" and, therefore, the two cases were different.

According to SAD, the UPA government should have \"solved\" the nuclear deal issue much earlier without letting the situation blow into \"such a massive crisis\". \"I personally feel that the communists have been consistent in their opposition to the deal while the SP has changed colours many times. We are getting to know that a lot of extraneous factors have driven the SP stand and it is not good,\" he said.

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