Day after Apna Dal asks NDA to respect allies, Anupriya skips Yogi Adityanath’s event

A day after Apna Dal(S), a constituent of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), said smaller parties should be respected by bigger allies, its senior leader and union minister of state for health Anupriya Patel skipped a programme of chief minister Yogi Adityanath in Deoria on Wednesday.

Though banners and posters put up at the venue carried her pictures, the Apna Dal (S) leaders claimed that Anupriya had skipped the programme as no formal invite had been extended to her for the laying of the foundation stone of medical colleges in Siddharth Nagar and Deoria, both encephalitis-prone districts of east Uttar Pradesh.

“No formal invitation was sent to Anupriya for the programmes at Siddharth Nagar (organised on December 25) as well as Deoria. Therefore, she did not attend the event in Deoria,” senior Apna Dal leader Anurag Patel said.

Another party leader in Gorakhpur, who did not wish to be named, said the BJP was ignoring its allies.

“Besides being a leader of an NDA constituent, Anupriya is also the minister of state for health at the Centre. The UP government should have invited her to the programme,” he said.

The development came a day after Ashish Patel, national president of the Apna Dal(S), said smaller parties should be respected and given due importance by bigger allies.

Patel added that his party was not happy with the BJP-led state government’s behaviour vis a vis Union Minister of State for Health Anupriya, also his wife.

He claimed that she was not given adequate importance and was not even invited for the foundation stone laying ceremony of the medical colleges.

In Siddharth Nagar, the CM had laid the foundation stone of a medical college on Tuesday. The programme was attended by Apna Dal leaders, including Shohratgarh MLA Amar Singh.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Apna Dal(S) had contested two seats, Mirzapur and Pratapgarh, and won both of them. While Anupriya Patel had won from Mirzapur, Harivansh Singh had bagged Pratapgarh.

The Apna Dal expressed its dissatisfaction days after Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RSLP) chief Upendra Kushwaha walked out of the NDA. Kushwaha was upset with the BJP after it asserted that the RLSP would not be given more than two seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

Earlier in March, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) had ended its four-year-old alliance with the NDA over the Centre’s refusal to grant special category status to Andhra Pradesh