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Mayawati hints at snapping ties with SP, BSP to contest UP bypolls alone
Mayawati told the gathering at the party headquarters that the BSP won 10 seats in Uttar Pradesh due to its traditional votebank but the votes of Samajwadi Party were not transferred to its candidates.
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) president Mayawati on Monday hinted at snapping the alliance with Samajwadi Party by announcing that her party would contest the bye-elections to 11 assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh on its own.
Addressing a meeting of party leaders from Uttar Pradesh in Delhi, Mayawati directed them to start preparation for the by-poll on the 11 assembly seats that had fallen vacant after the election of the sitting MLAs to Lok Sabha.
Mayawati’s indication of ending the alliance sent the SP leaders into a huddle. SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said the party leadership will meet to discuss the issue. “We are yet to receive an official statement of the BSP chief. SP chief Akhilesh Yadav will give a statement on the development on continuing the alliance with BSP,” he said.
The BJP said the BSP-SP alliance was an opportunistic one to begin with.
“The alliance between BSP-SP-RLD was opportunistic and to serve vested political interests and to cheat the common people. It was not an alliance of ideology and principles. Akhilesh should come clear on the charges leveled by Mayawati that he failed to transfer SP votes to BSP,” BJP spokesperson Salabh Mani Tripathi said,
Mayawati has been in Delhi since May 25 and reviewing the party’s performance in various states in the recent Lok Sabha elections.
A senior BSP leader, familiar with the developments, said Mayawati blamed Akhilesh for the poor performance of the alliance in the election.
According to the leader, the BSP chief said that the ongoing feud in the Yadav family between Akhilesh and his uncle Shivpal Yadav, president of Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia) cast a shadow on the fortunes of the alliance in the crucial electoral battle.
“Samajwadi Party failed to transfer its votes to BSP candidates. The Yadav community, considered the core vote base of the SP, voted for the BJP candidates on majority of the seats, dumping the alliance candidate,” the leader quoted her as saying.
“Senior SP leaders as well as family members of Akhilesh, including his wife Dimple Yadav and cousins Dharmendra Yadav and Akshya Yadav lost the elections due to shift in the Yadav community vote bank,” she said. “The BSP got Muslim and Dalit votes, which helped the party in bagging 10 seats,” she added.
“Shivpal had fielded candidates on majority of the Lok Sabha seats. A founder member of SP, Shivpal used his influence to transfer a large chunk of Yadav votes to the BJP. It clearly indicates that Akhilesh has lost grip on the Yadav community voters. He was unable to transfer the SP vote to alliance candidates. In such a scenario, continuing the alliance with SP will damage the prospects of the alliance partners,” Mayawati said.
The BSP leader said though Mayawati did not announce that BSP was ending the alliance with SP and RLD, she put the ball in the court of Akhilesh and Ajit Singh (RLD chief) with a clear cut message that there was no utility in continuing the alliance.
The BSP and the SP had announced their alliance in January in Lucknow.
Mayawati also rejigged the state unit organization in U.P. and dissolved the divisional, zonal and assembly units. The district unit organizations will continue to function.
The BSP chief said the ‘bhai-chara’ (brotherhood) committee will be constituted in all assembly segments to spread the base of the party among all communities. The committee will work to revive the social engineering formula that brought BSP to power in the 2007 assembly election, the BSP leader said.
