Voices

India Today, May 10, 1999
May 10, 1999

"The vote of a chief minister was used to remove India's prime minister. Is democracy only a numbers game?"
Atal Bihari Vajpayee, care-taker prime minister

"They have ensured the BJP remains, if not in power, then to run elections."
H.S. Surjeet, CPI(M) general secretary, blaming the Congress and the SP for the Opposition's failed bid to form a government

"No. We are not ready to pardon. We will not support a third or fourth front, whatever it is called."
Sonia Gandhi, Congress president

"For the Congress, the target is always my party."
Mulayam Singh Yadav, Samajwadi Party president

"The DMK and the Jan Sangh became friends during the Emergency. We are now facing another emergency."
Murasoli Maran, DMK leader

"I gave a chance to all secular parties to form an alternative government. If they could not, it is not my failure."
J. Jayalalitha, AIADMK chief

"We must walk into it with the belief that we will win. That's what counts."
Ajay Jadeja, cricketer, on the World Cup, in The Indian Express

"I admit I'm a flop star ... I can't fall any lower."
Sunil Shetty, filmstar, in Cine Blitz