New Delhi : NCP said had Congress chief Sonia Gandi become the Prime Minister in 2004, Sharad Pawar would have kept out of the government but supported it.

Party spokesman D P Tripathi told PTI that Pawar had himself said after the UPA-I came to power that if Gandhi had become the Prime Minister he would have opted out of the government but his party would have supported it at that time. Tripathi’s remarks came in the backdrop of recent revelations by Kalam in his forthcoming book that he was ready to swear-in Sonia as PM despite intense lobbying by some parties against the Congress chief.

Pawar had parted ways with Congress in 1999 along with P A Sangma and Tariq Anwar on the foreign origin issue of Sonia Gandhi.

Soon after NCP became a partner in the coalition goverment in Maharashtra headed by Congress, Pawar’s party became part of Congress-led UPA since May 2004.