New Delhi: In a veiled attack on the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday said a party that has deviated from Dalit icon B.R. Ambedkar’s ideals is fighting the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections with the sole purpose of stopping his party from defeating the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
“Samajwadi Party is working to defeat the BJP, but one party intends to stop the SP,” Yadav said without naming the BSP, PTI reported.
“The party has deviated from the ideals of Dalit icon B.R. Ambedkar and is contesting (polls) not to win, but to help the BJP retain power,” he said.
Asserting that for protecting the Constitution, Yadav said the Samajwadis and Ambedkarites have to jointly bring a change in the state because this election will decide the future of youth.
The former Uttar Pradesh chief minister said many people of that party have joined the Samajwadi Party.
Yadav’s remarks come as a majority of the 19 BSP MLAs, who had won in 2017, have joined the Samajwadi Party, ahead of the 2022 assembly elections.
The Samajwadi Party chief also took a dig at Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath over his “garmi nikalna” (to calm down somebody) remark stating the BJP has “cooled down” after the first round of polls.
“The second round (of voting) will further cool them down,” he added.
Expressing confidence of the Samajwadi Party-Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) coming to power in Uttar Pradesh, Yadav said going by the first phase of polling on 58 seats on February 10, people have made up their mind to defeat the BJP.
“We don’t have to wait till March 10 (counting of votes) to know the result,” he added.
Earlier on Thursday evening, electioneering ended for the first phase of assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.
58 constituencies spread across 11 districts, including Shamli (Prabuddh Nagar), Meerut, Hapur (Panchsheel Nagar), Muzaffarnagar, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Bulandshahar, Aligarh, Agra, Gautam Buddha Nagar and Mathura, voted in this phase.
Voting for the 403-member Uttar Pradesh Assembly is being held in seven phases.
Polling will be held on 55 assembly seats in the second phase on February 14.
59 assembly seats will go to the polls in the third phase on February 20, while 60 seats will go to polls in the fourth phase on February 23.
Polling will be held on 60 assembly seats in the fifth phase on February 27, 57 seats in the sixth phase on March 3 and 54 seats in the seventh phase on March 7.
The counting of votes will be held on March 10.