Vajpayee wanted to join VP Singh’s JD

NEW DELHI: Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee wanted to leave the BJP to join VP Singh in 1987-88, when Singh quit the Congress to form the Janata Dal. So says Singh in his memoir, Manzil Se Zyada Safar, released in New Delhi on Sunday evening on the occasion of his 75th birthday. The book is written in question-answer format, in conversation with journalist Ram Bahadur Rai.

In his memoir, Singh says that though he never spoke to Vajpayee directly about joining the Janata Dal, former Union minister Jaswant Singh and Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat knew about the matter and acted as interlocutors. But Singh feared the move would benefit the Congress, so the matter never reached its logical conclusion.

He also says Sonia Gandhi refused the post of Prime Minister in May 2004 because intelligence agencies had submitted a report projecting an increased threat perception to her life if she took the top post.He says she also did not want to give the BJP and other opposition parties an issue that could divide the country. He denies that President APJ Abdul Kalam had reservations against inviting Sonia to form the government. Singh indicates that his information is based on conversations with Gandhi, her children, and associate ML Fotedar.

"ML Fotedar came to me to say that senior leaders must know that there is a serious threat to Sonia's life if she accepts the PM’s post. I told him that Congress party has every right to choose its leader, but the matter of the threat must be kept in mind. After all, we have seen what happened to Rajiv Gandhi,” he says.

"Thereafter, I went to 10, Janpath to meet Sonia. I found Sonia to be very sensitive and clear in her political understanding,"he says.