Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati and Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday announced their alliance in Uttar Pradesh for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, sharing 38 seats each out of the state’s 80 parliamentary constituencies.
The parties kept the Congress out of the alliance, but said they will not field candidates in Amethi and Rae Bareli, represented by Congress president Rahul Gandhi and United Progressive Alliance chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
“We have left Amethi and Rae Bareli Lok Sabha seats for Congress without an alliance with them so that the BJP does not succeed,” Mayawati said.
The alliance left two more seats for smaller allies.
Making the announcement at a joint press conference with Akhilesh in Lucknow, Mayawati said that the alliance will rob Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah of their sleep.
Mayawati called the alliance ‘a new political revolution’.
“We have decided to contest upcoming Lok Sabha elections together, this will lead to a new political revolution in the country. The alliance has been made keeping public interest in mind,” she said while addressing the joint press conference.
The sole objective of the alliance, Mayawati said, would be to defeat the BJP rule. But she added that the BSP and the SP would not ally with the Congress party in the upcoming elections.
“Whether the mandate goes to the Congress or BJP, it is one and the same thing. Congress ruled the country for many years. At this time, the public was unhappy with their rule. The Congress lost out on power due to the Bofors scam, and now, the BJP will lose due to Rafale.
“The Congress imposed declared emergency, today there is undeclared emergency. SP and BSP have both had separate experiences with the Congress from past alliances.
“Both BSP and SP have experienced in the past that Congress’s vote is not transferable, based on which we have decided that we will not ally with the Congress,” Mayawati explained.
On the eve of the announcement, Akhilesh had said that the BJP, which the alliance intends to take on, has been using poll alliances for gains.
“Whatever arithmetic we learnt from the BJP, we will implement it,” he said at an event here on Friday.
SP and BSP have been in talks for weeks to forge an alliance.
A recent meeting between Yadav and Mayawati had triggered a lot of speculation about seat-sharing being firmed up.
There was, however, ambiguity over whether the Congress would be a part of the alliance, amid indications that the SP and BSP were not inclined to include the party.
With ANI inputs
Source: Rediff