BSP open to alliances if given respectable share: Mayawati

BSP supremo Mayawati on Thursday said she is not averse to electoral tie-ups with like-minded parties to stop the juggernaut of the "BJP and other communal forces", but the BSP will do so only if it is given a "respectable share".

In Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat, the Congress party, she claimed, was not even ready to part with some of the seats it has traditionally been losing. "Under this mindset, no forward movement can take place on alliance issues."

The Dalit leader informed that although her close aide Satish Chandra Mishra and political advisor to Congress President Ahmad Patel held meetings for seat sharing in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat, nothing concrete emerged, forcing the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to abandon the efforts.

"Situation is such that now Mishra has even stopped mulling any such alliance efforts," she said, adding that while in Gujarat the Congress had offered to give 25 of its lost seats of the total 182, in Himachal Pradesh, 10 of the seats it lost of the total 68.

"Our experiences of alliances with the Congress in Uttar Pradesh in 1996 and with the Samajwadi party (SP) in 1993 were also not very good," she added, explaining her party's reluctance to engaging with opposition unity efforts.

She also accused the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of using muscle and money power against its candidates in the forthcoming urban body polls.

At a meeting of BSP leaders to review the party's preparedness for the polls, Mayawati forewarned her party candidates to be wary of the "machinations of the BJP" and not to "fall prey to their tricks".

The BSP is contesting the urban body polls for the first time in the state on its own symbol. It had so far given support to independent contestants in the past.

Mayawati also alleged that of late, the BJP was trying to spread a rumour that she was trying to push her brother and nephew into politics and that the next generations were in the pipeline to take over the party leadership.

--IANS

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