Naveen keeps Advani guessing

Bhubaneswar: Keeping its options open in national politics despite severing ties with the BJP at the state level, the BJD today said that it is still a part of the NDA.

"We are still part of the NDA. Therefore, it will be premature to say anything now on the role of the BJD in national politics," BJD's secretary general Damodar Rout said, adding things would be clear once the polls were over.

Trusting Naveen was a dangerous step: BJP

BJD supremo Naveen Patnaik has also maintained complete silence about joining the third front although CPI(M) politburo member Sitaram Yechury had rushed to Orissa to formally invite Patnaik to join the anti-Advani, anti-Congress platform.

"We will take a decision in this regard after the elections," Patnaik told reporters after meeting Yechury though BJD agreed to strike a pre-poll alliance with the Left parties.

The Left parties, which had two MLAs (one of CPI and the other of CPI(M)) in the Orissa house of 147 MLAs, were encouraged over the breaking of the BJD-BJP alliance, but Patnaik has kept them guessing on which way BJD will lean in national politics post elections.