India's Gandhi Walks Away from PM Job

18/05/2004| IslamWeb

Sonia Gandhi has declined to serve as prime minister of India, leaving the question of who will take the post unanswered. "The post of prime minister has not been my aim," Gandhi told incoming MPs of her Congress party on Tuesday. "I would follow my inner voice. Today, it tells me that I must humbly decline this post," Gandhi said in parliament. Supporters immediately interrupted her with shouts of disappointment, briefly stopping her from speaking. "My aim has always been to protect the secular foundations of our nation," Gandhi continued. "We have waged a successful battle but we have not won the war. That is a long and arduous struggle and I will continue it with full determination." "I request you to accept my decision and I will not revert," she said. "There is no question. It is my inner voice, it is my conscience." Gandhi's Congress party ousted India's Hindu nationalists last Thursday in possibly India's biggest election upset. Short of an outright parliamentary majority, Congress has been discussing coalition arrangements with leftist parties, notably India's main communist bloc. **Uncertainty*** As the leader of the biggest bloc in Parliament, Gandhi had been expected to be named prime minister on Tuesday in a meeting at the presidential palace. But the 57-year-old widow of murdered former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi left the ornate, colonial-era building empty handed, with the question of who will lead the world's largest democracy left hanging. The prospect of the Italian-born Gandhi becoming prime minister had divided many Indians but her decision not to take the post will end that debate. Reports in the Indian media suggested Gandhi is instead forwarding the names of Manmohan Singh and Pranab Kumar Mukerjee, both of whom were Congress finance ministers, as possible premiers.