Samikhsya Bureau
The Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) alliance on Thursday announced the Lok Sabha seats both will be contesting in the upcoming parliamentary elections. But SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav has come down on his son and party president Akhilesh Yadav for aligning with the BSP.
According to the agreement reached over a month and a half by SP president Akhilesh Yadav and BSP supremo Mayawati, the SP will contest in 37 seats and the BSP in 38 seats. The two parties also left two Lok Sabha seats for the Congress and another three for the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) in anticipation of an alliance.
The five seats left for other parties are Rae Bareli and Amethi for the Congress, and Baghpat, Muzaffarnagar and Mathura for the RLD. Earlier in the day, RLD issued a statement saying that it would ally with SP-BSP alliance.
According to the list, the SP will contest in Moradabad, Rampur, Sambhal, Ghaziabad, Bareilly, Pilibhit, Kheri, Hardoi, Lucknow, Unnao, Faizaibad, Barabanki, Bahriach, Gonda, Gorakhpur, Maharajganj, Ballia, Azamgarh, Chandauli, Varanasi, Robertsganj, Mirzapur, Phulpur, Allahabad, Banda, Jhansi, Kanpur, Etawah, Kannauj, Mainpuri, Kushinagar, Etah, Ferozabad, Hatras, Badaun, Kaushambi and Kairana.
The 38 Lok Sabha constituencies where the BSP will contest are: Bijnore, Amroha, Aonla, Shahjahanpur, Bhadoi, Sitapur, Mishrikh, Mohanlalganj, Pratapgarh, Sultanpur, Akbarpur, Kaiserganj, Fatehpur Sikri, Basti, Doomariaganj, Nagina, Basgaon, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Salempur, Deoria, Ghosi, Lalganj, Machillishar, Jaunpur, Ambedkarnagar, Ghazipur, Sant Kabirnagar, Fatehpur,Hamirpur, Jalaun, Dhaurara, Shravasti, Farrukhabad, Agra, Aligarh, Bulandshahr, Meerut and Saharanpur.
However, the arrangement has clearly left Mulayam Singh Yadav fuming. Claiming that the BJP is far ahead in preparation for the ensuing Lok Sabha polls in Uttar Pradesh, he criticised his son for “finishing” the SP by 50 per cent by contesting just a half of total 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state. While addressing the party workers at the state SP headquarters in Lucknow, Mulayam Singh Yadav said that delaying the announcement of candidates would further weaken the prospect of the party.
This was the first reaction of Mulayam Singh Yadav (in pic) over the SP-BSP alliance in Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha polls and as expected he denounced his son and party president for the alliance.
“Who is finishing the party?” the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister said in an obvious criticism of his son. “The fight of SP is against BJP and the party workers should pull up their socks to fight and win majority of contesting seats.”
He further said that when BJP was well-prepared for the polls and they had already selected their candidates, SP was yet to decide on the same.
Recently, the SP patriarch raised eyebrows when he praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Lok Sabha and even gave him blessing for his second term.
Mulayam Singh Yadav, who founded SP, has a strained relationship with his son since the latter formed an alliance with Congress before the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. Though the alliance lost the elections, former chief minister Akhilesh Singh Yadav has strengthened his hold over the party.
With their pre-poll alliance, both Akhilesh Singh Yadav and Mayawati are confident of defeating the BJP in the state. But the threat of Mulayam Singh Yadav being a spoiler may make the contest more dramatic.
(With agency inputs)
