http://www.tribuneindia.com/20010112/punjab13.htm

JALANDHAR, Jan 11 (UNI) -The Bahujan Samaj Party supremo, Mr Kanshi Ram, today said he was scouting for a Jat or a leader from the general category to project him as the next chief minister of Punjab because the Dalits in the state lacked a leader of stature for the top job.

Addressing a cadre camp of backward classes here, he said while the BSP had progressed by leaps and bounds elsewhere in the country, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, since 1984, it failed to make much headway in Punjab because it lacked a Dalit leader who had the grit and determination to become the chief minister of the state. Therefore, in the circumstances, he has no option but to project a Jat or general category leader for the high office.

The BSP supremo's open advocacy for a Jat chief minister is significant in the backdrop of his series of meetings with dissident senior Akali leader Ravi Inder Singh, with whom he held a five-hour-long closed-door meeting here on December 24 last. Mr Ravi Inder Singh, who made three unsuccessful attempts to pull down the government of Mr Parkash Singh Badal last year, had admitted that he discussed politics with Mr Kanshi Ram during the meeting, which was arranged by the Editor of a local Punjabi daily, considered close to the Dalit leader.