Anupriya Patel admits friction in Apna Dal-BJP alliance

Apna Dal leader Anupriya Patel on Thursday agreed that there is a tussle going on between the Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) and her party regarding seat for the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly polls.

Admitting that problems do exist in an alliance, she said, "There is problem over seat-sharing whenever there is an alliance between a national party and a regional party."

Expressing confidence, Patel said support base is there for both parties in the politically crucial state.

"Our efforts will be to safeguard the position of both parties. If the worker of either of the alliance partner gets upset with the seat sharing then electoral results will not be as expected," Patel told ANI here.

Patel, who is the Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Cabinet, had earlier expressed her disappointment over the BJP's list.

Patel is said to be upset over the fact that the BJP has fielded its candidates even in those assembly constituencies where the Apna Dal is better placed. She is expected to meet the BJP central leadership to lodge her protest.

Patel had won the 2012 assembly polls from the Rohaniya constituency in Varanasi. The second seat of contention is that of Mirzapur for which the BJP has fielded Anuraj Singh, son of former state BJP president Om Prakash Singh. The third constituency is Banda's Manikpur from which BJP's R K Patel is slated to contest the polls.

Also, no leader from 'Apna Dal' was included in the list of star campaigners too. The three stalwarts from 'Apna Dal' -- Anupriya Patel from Mirzapur, Dr Manoj Kumar Pandey from Chandouli and Manoj Sinha from Ghazipur -- have not been included in the list of star campaigners.

With the stage set for the seven-phase assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, the BJP earlier on January 21 released the third list of its candidates and 40 star campaigners. Since then, the party has been facing criticism of nepotism and awarding turncoats.