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Babbar defiant, SP sees US hand in row
He said Amar Singh was a senior party leader and no one would be allowed to touch him.
Agra is in the thick of things. And part of it borders on insanity. In a new twist to the Raj Babbar-Samajwadi Party row, the latter accused the US of conspiring to rock the boat. Sources said the party was probing Babbar's alleged links with the US.
Addressing the media on Monday, SP general secretary Mohan Singh said at a time when the Agra unit had been opposing US president George Bush's visit to the city of Taj, the actor-MP's activity has raised suspicion. They said the US embassy in Delhi could have a hand behind Babbar's tirade.
Trying to establish a tenuous link between between the two, Singh said the way US envoy David Mulford had been issuing statements on the country's internal issues, the possibility of US trying to weaken the SP could not be ruled out. He said the party would probe the matter.
When pointed out that chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav had accused the Congress, Singh said the Congress and the US envoy were in league. He said Amar Singh was a senior party leader and no one would be allowed to touch him. Singh said he would talk to Babbar later.
The actor, meanwhile, is on the defensive. With the possibility of his removal becom ing imminent, Babbar on Monday stepped up his tirade against general secretary Amar Singh. Saying he had been associated with the party since 1967, Babbar said he would not desert the party even if sacked.
Reiterating his charges against Singh, the rebel MP said chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav was an emotional man and those with whom he forges a "bond make things difficult for him". The Congress tried to fish in troubled waters on Monday. It saw Samajwadi Party MP Babbar's diatribe against his leadership as a reflection of the "pent-up anger" of workers upset with the SP's "five-star culture and dubious socialism".
"Babbar has tried to expose what the Congress always accused the SP of...that it practised hypocrisy, duplicity and double standards and paid lipservice to socialism,'' said Abhishek Singhvi, AICC spokesman, even as speculation mounted that the actorturned-politician might drop anchor at 24 Akbar Road if he is expelled from the party.
