Channel faces ire of Amar

By Our Special Correspondent

New Delhi

July 5: Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh on Saturday expressed his ire against a TV news channel here for airing programmes depicting him in a "poor light".

Before starting his press conference, Mr Singh asked the reporter and cameraperson of the news channel to leave, saying that he did not like the manner in which the channel was showing old clippings of him verbally attacking the Congress and its president Sonia Gandhi. "Those who say I have changed my position (vis-à-vis the Congress) should remember what Sharad Pawar had said about Sonia Gandhi, what Karunanidhi and T.R. Baalu have said earlier," he said.

Interestingly, Mr Singh said he still had differences with the Congress on some issues.

"It is not just Om Prakash Chautala and Chandrababu Naidu who have done politics against the Congress. Even I have been doing politics against the Congress," he said, criticising the UPA’s failure to check price rise.

Demanding a ban on the export of petroleum on the lines of steel and cement, he said "private refineries should not be given the status of exporting companies".

Mr Singh said despite these differences with the Congress, he was supporting it on the nuclear deal as former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam had convinced them that it was in the interest of the country.

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‘UPA will definitely sign deal’

Raiganj (WB), July 5: The UPA government will sign the civil nuclear deal with the USA in time "come what may" and there was no threat to the government, Union minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi said here on Saturday. ‘’There is absolutely no threat to the UPA government which will sign the nuclear deal with the US in time, come what may. There is no hesitation in this regard,’’ Mr Das Munshi said.

—PTI