PM for Bajrang Dal ban but needs more proof

WAITING TO STRIKE: Manmohan wants a team of Central Govt ministers visit Orissa to ascertain facts.

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New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is in favour of a ban on the Bajrang Dal but will wait for a central team of ministers to go to Orissa, government sources told CNN-IBN.

The Prime Minister is finding it difficult to take a decision and it's not the allies who are binding his hands but his own party colleagues.

Sources have told CNN -IBN that despite Manmohan wanting an immediate ban on the Bajrang Dal, he has decided to wait because Home Minister Shivraj Patil felt that he needed some more time to get a strong case against the Dal.

During the Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Union Law minister HR Bhardwaj argeed that insufficient facts would mean a weak case against Bajrang Dal which could fall in a court of law.

But with mounting pressure from the allies, it may be difficult for the Prime Minister to postpone the decision.

"The formalities will be completed. Where there is a will there is a way. The government should ban the Bajrang Dal immediately," Lok Jan Shakti Party chied and Minister of Chemicals & Fertilizers and Steel, Ram Vilas Paswan, said.

Allies like Ram Vilas Paswan and Lalu Prasad have argued forcefully for a ban on the Dal as it would help their minority votebank.

While the Congress too has been demanding a ban, it is also worried about the dividends the Bharatiya Janata Party could reap out of it.

So for now the government has decided to buy time. Manmohan has suggested that a team of Central Ministers visit the state to ascertain facts.

The government and Congress strategy is very simple that if you can't do it make maximum noise about it and that is why the government is treading extremely cautiously over the ban on Bajrang Dal.