SHILLONG: UDP president Dr Donkupar Roy along with party legislator Jemino Mawthoh met HSPDP president Hoping Stone Lyngdoh at his residence on Wednesday evening to seek his party’s support to unitedly fight the upcoming Lok Sabha election.
Confirming this, the HSPDP president said that both the UDP leaders have requested the HSPDP to join forces to take on the Congress in the upcoming election.
“Dr Roy and Dr Mawthoh also stressed that they can win the Shillong Parliamentary seat only if they put up a common candidate of non-Congress forces,” Lyngdoh said after the meeting.
The HSPDP chief, however, denied that the UDP leaders had made any request to support their party candidate Paul Lyngdoh.
“Our discussion mainly revolved around the possibility of putting up a common candidate,” the HSPDP president said.
Lyngdoh informed that he had assured the UDP leaders that he would discuss their proposal with the party leaders.
“We have agreed to meet again for further discussion on the issue,” Lyngdoh said.
When asked why the party did not send a delegation to attend the meeting called by the UDP, the HSPDP president said he was not aware of any such meeting.
While denying the claim of some leaders of the party that they have unanimously taken a decision to support People’s Candidate Forum (PCF) Rev. PBM Basaiawmoit, Lyngdoh reiterated that the party was yet to take any decision to support Rev. Basaiawmoit.
“I have already stated that there is no justification to support someone who refuses to have any kind of association with the party,” the HSPDP president said.
Meanwhile, HSPDP spokesperson G Nonglong said that the media had reportedly distorted the proceedings of the HSPDP meeting by stating that only “a section of the party leaders led by its vice president Ardent Basaiawmoit is putting pressure on the Party President to support Rev Basaiawmoit” in the ensuing Lok Sabha election.
“Any decision of the party is not taken by a section of party leaders as reported in the media. Moreover, the president himself ‘nowhere’ mentioned that the decision was taken by the vice president and a section of leaders.
“This is a malicious intent to defame, insinuate and create confusion in the minds of the public related to the internal affairs of the party,” Nonglong said adding that the party would approach the Press Council of India if the media failed to clarify this point.