Lucknow: On Tuesday, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) formally dumped the Congress party for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, with its chief Mayawati stating that her party will not have an alliance with Rahul Gandhi’s party in any state. Mayawati said “It has been reiterated once again that Bahujan Samaj Party will not have any alliance with Congress party in any state, to contest the upcoming elections,”.
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It is to be noted that the announcement comes in the wake of the BSP deciding to ally with Akhilesh Yadav's Samajwadi Party for Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh. Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal too is part of the SP-BSP alliance, which left out the Congress from the pre-poll pact. Out of the 80 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh, the SP-BSP decided not to contest on two Congress bastions of Amethi and Rae Bareli, represented by Rahul and Sonia Gandhi, respectively.
Yadav told Gulf News in an interview “I think now Congress party should help this alliance, now that the parties have started going to the field. It is too late for them now, everybody’s prepared and we all must understand that the Bharatiya Janata Party is a stronger force. They have alliances with several parties, they have the strength of the RSS,”.
Meanwhile, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav on Monday said it was too late to accomodate the COngress in the UP alliance.