Akhilesh Yadav underplays LS poll debacle, calls it 'failed experiment'

The SP chief said the experiment exposed the weaknesses of such an association, but also offered some valuable lessons

Dumped by Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati after their alliance came a cropper in the national election, Samajwadi Party leader and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav sought to explain away the failure as just an unsuccessful experiment. "I have been a science student. There are trials and sometimes trials fail," the Samajwadi Party leader told his party colleagues. Underplaying what is largely seen as a failure of the Opposition parties to come together against the Bharatiya Janata Party juggernaut, he said the experiment exposed the weaknesses of such an association, but also offered some valuable lessons. Unlike Mayawati, he was not ready to call time on the gathbandhan.

A window of opportunity

An opportunity has opened up before the Congress party to consolidate its position in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly where it is surviving on a thin majority (with the help of SP-BSP). Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader G S Damor won the Jhabua-Ratlam Lok Sabha seat defeating Kantilal Bhuria of the Congress. He was sitting MLA from Jhabua (he had defeated Bhuria’s son Vikrant in the Assembly polls). He has resigned from that seat and if the Congress manages to win the Jhabua by-election, its total strength in the Assembly will increase to 115. The simple majority mark is 116. In the 2018 Assembly election Congress got 114 and the BJP 109 seats. After Damor’s resignation, the BJP's strength has reduced to 108. The Congress is hopeful that winning the bypoll will strengthen the Kamal Nath government in the state.

Eid bonhomie

Minister for Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s Bihar leader Syed Shahnawaz Hussain hosted Eid lunches at their residences in the national capital on Wednesday. Senior BJP leaders and union ministers, among others, attended. Attendance at both their lunches was better than what it was during the Eid festivities last summer. Party sources said BJP Chief Amit Shah's reprimand of Union minister and party leader Giriraj Singh on Tuesday for ridiculing Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and others for attending an 'iftar' in Patna was also a signal to party leaders to attend Naqvi and Hussain's Eid lunches. While Naqvi has found a place in the union cabinet and is a Rajya Sabha member, Hussain is a party spokesperson.