Uttar Pradesh: BJP not to project CM face for Assembly polls

LUCKNOW: BJP will not project a chief ministerial candidate for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections which are a few months away, party's state unit chief Keshav Prasad Maurya said today. "All political parties are waiting for the chief ministerial candidate of BJP...It is clear policy of our party that we will contest the Assembly elections without projecting anyone as our CM candidate," he told news persons in Bareilly. "BJP had projected CM faces in Assam and Delhi Assembly polls...While we succeeded in the former, we lost the latter ...We fought Haryana and Jharkhand without projecting any CM candidate and won," Maurya said. He said BJP will win over 300 of the 403 seats in UP and the party's central parliamentary board will decide who has to be the chief minister. Earlier in Badaun, Maurya accused BSP chief Mayawati of degrading religious leaders for which, he said, the electorate will teach her a lesson in the coming polls. Reacting to Mayawati's charges that RSS and BJP workers were presented as Buddhist monks in the 'Dhamma Chetna Yatra' in Kanpur last week, Maurya said, "Her mental balance appears a little disturbed as a large number of her party men have deserted her. "By making this statement, she has degraded religious leaders and Lord Buddha as well and she will see its result through the EVMs," he said. To a question as to whether BJP will accept Akhilesh Yadav in its fold if he quits SP, Maurya said no member of the Saifai family has any place in his party. Saifai is the native place of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav. When his attention was drawn to controversial SP leader Azam Khan facing sediton charges in a Badaun court, Maurya said only BJP government can arrest him in connection with various cases and charges. Terming 'triple talaq' as anti-women, he said it needs to be done away with. Maurya also warned Pakistan to desist from anti-India stance or "else Indian forces will unfurl the tri-colour in Islamabad soon".