'It's not a major issue. We are hopeful the issue will be resolved tonight or latest by Tuesday night. If it is not resolve by Wednesday, then there will be indeed serious problems,' a senior party leader said on condition of anonymity.
Despite Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's (DMK) refusal to reconsider its decision to quit the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, Congress today dismissed suggestions of any threat to the Manmohan Singh government and indicated if the deadlock over seat-sharing for Tami Nadu assembly polls was not resolved in a day or two "then there will be indeed serious problems".
"Have you seen well-established alliances breaking up a fortnight before election campaigning is to start on an issue like demand for three more seats?
"It's not a major issue. We are hopeful the issue will be resolved tonight or latest by Tuesday night. If it is not resolve by Wednesday, then there will be indeed serious problems," a senior party leader said on condition of anonymity.
The leader also did not attach much importance to DMK's possible execution of the threat of its ministers'resigning from the government after meeting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the evening.
"Resignations do not make much difference. They can later also be withdrawn," he said adding he was "hopeful" of an early solution to the problem which he described as "nothing else but hard bargaining for seats so natural in an alliance."
At the AICC briefing, party spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi described as the creation of "minds of fertile imagination" the talks of a threat to the UPA government.
Asked whether Congress was open to the idea of aligning with AIADMK, Singhvi remarked "I am not going into any speculative and hypothetical question at this stage."
Singhvi's refrain to a host of questions on the fate of the alliance, including whether Congress has dumped DMK in a big brotherly act, was that "there are no new developments. Our alliance is at the same stage where it was earlier. No new facts or developments have come so far."
He said that the party has nothing more to say at this time. "Give us some time. Have a little patience. Let us not speculate. Let us not go into the details of it now. When we will have something in due course, we will share it with you," he said.
Singhvi also rejected the contention that home minister P Chidambaram heading the seat-sharing negotiations with the DMK, has been kept out from the exercise to resolve the crisis and there was a perception that he goofed up.
"There is no question of he being kept out and kept in. He is a part of the negotating committee," Singhvi said.
A leader, speaking on condition of anonymity suggested Congress was not surprised with the sudden move by DMK adding there is a "method in the madness".
He said DMK had used similar tactics in the past when it was part of NDA and now doing it as part of UPA.
Sources in the party, said more than the number of seats, it were certain seats on which the two parties differed.
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