NDA will decide its prime ministerial candidate at the “appropriate time” ahead of the next general elections, JD(U) national president Sharad Yadav on Friday said.
“It is needless to discuss NDA’s prime ministerial candidate right now as the general elections are far away,” he told newsmen who pressed him to disclose the name of the opposition alliance’s best bet to take on Congress Vice-president Rahul Gandhi in the next Lok Sabha elections.
Mr. Yadav, who is also the NDA convenor, expressed happiness over the unopposed election of Rajnath Singh as the national president of major partner BJP and said his experience would help NDA in the next parliamentary polls.
He exuded confidence that the BJP-led alliance would return to power in the next parliamentary polls as the electorate were “sick” of the UPA government which was guilty of destroying the country’s economy due to its short-sighted policies.
Asked about the key issues in the next general elections, he said price rise and corruption would definitely be the decisive ones.
The JD(U) president flayed the Centre’s decision to phase out subsidy on diesel and said farmers should continue to get this fuel on subsidised rate. Commercial users, however, must pay the market rate for it.
The Centre, he said, should frame a policy to provide diesel at subsidised rate to the farmers and charge market rate from the commercial consumers.
Mr. Yadav, who arrived here for a week-long visit to Madhepura, his parliamentary constituency, flayed RJD chief and former Railway minister Lalu Prasad for making ‘empty promises’ of setting up a rail engine factory in Bihar.
The project, which was billed to come up at Madhepura, has not seen the light of the day even though the announcement was made seven years ago.
He said he had spoken to Railway Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal about the project and hoped that it would be revived.
