The Nationalist Congress Party on Friday said that the defeat of its coalition partner Congress in the assembly elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh show that the party was ignorant of ground realities.

Party president Sharad Pawar [Images], while addressing a rally in Kochi, said that the Congress was working without knowing the ground realities.

The rally was organised after Congress recently welcomed back senior leader K Karunakaran, who left the NCP to return to his parent party.

Pawar, however, remained silent on Karunakaran's return to the Congress.

The NCP leader further said that all progressive and secular political parties, including the Left, should come together to keep at bay communal forces like the BJP.

Stating that national politics cannot move forward without the NCP, Pawar said that it was an important party. In Gujarat, the NCP had won three seats. "With this, the party has made its presence felt in 11 assemblies," he said.

Karunakaran's son K Muraleedharan, who is still with the NCP and is heading the Kerala [Images] unit of the party, said that Karunakaran had of and on been telling the media that he (Muraleedharan) would also follow his father back to the Congress.

"I will not go back to the Congress," he reiterated.

Still smarting with anger at his father's decision to join the Congress, he said the veteran leader was being insulted by the parent party even now.

Karunakaran, a senior politician, had to go to All India Congress Committee Secretary Mohsina Kidwai's residence to meet her and had to take permission to hold a rally from Sonia Gandhi [Images], Oommen Chandy and Ramesh Chennithala, Muraleedharan said.

Pawar, who is the Union Agriculture Minister, said that the NCP had submitted a proposal to the government on waiver of loans or granting loans on reduced interest rates to help farmers.