The Indian National League (INL) will think of a formal alliance with the United Democratic Front (UDF) only after the coming local body elections in the State, party State general secretary P.M.A. Salam, MLA, has said. The party had snapped ties with the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) on Thursday last after a 14-year association.
“We will take a decision on entering the UDF on the basis of the outcome of the local body elections,” Mr. Salam, who won the Calicut-II constituency in the 2006 Assembly election as an LDF-backed candidate, told The Hindu on Sunday.
There will be ‘seat adjustments' in the local body elections. “They will vote for us and we will vote for them,” he said. When pointed out that Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala had recently ruled out the inclusion of more parties in the UDF, Mr. Salam said, “We have not applied for admission.”
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The INL, which broke away from the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) over the 1992 Babri Masjid demolition, had been an LDF co-traveller for 14 years. The party had helped in the LDF victories in Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in the past in the Malabar region.
Ibrahim Sulaiman Sait, long-time MP and IUML all-India head before he formed the breakaway faction, had wanted the IUML to leave the Congress camp as he believed the party had facilitated the Masjid demolition.
The INL still believed that the Congress had a role in the demolition,
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Mr. Salam said adding that the party (Congress) had later regretted it. He hinted that his party did not want to harp on the Masjid issue as ‘there were many other important issues now.' The INL left the LDF because of its ‘intolerance,' he said.