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Congress, BSP relations worsen: BSP may revive alliance with BJP |
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With the worsening of relations between the Congress and Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party, there are reports that the BSP and BJP may be inching closer to each other.
The Congress on its part, has toughened its stance on Mayawati’s threat to withdraw support to the UPA government. The party said that there was no provocation for the ultimatum but at the same time it said that the law would take its own course in Income Tax cases against the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister. The party said that it does not favour any legal leniency in return for the BSP continuing support to the UPA.
“In the Congress, we always say that the law will take its own course. This is applicable in the case of Mayawati too. We don’t believe that she is being unnecessarily harassed,” said Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh.
On Sunday, February 10, Mayawati said that her party would consider withdrawal of support to the UPA government after the Budget session of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly concludes on March 10.
The Congress again raised the issue of the huge wealth amassed by the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo. “She has to clearly say whether this money was a donation to the party fund or a gift by her loyalists. The government should know the source of the gifts. She (Mayawati) can’t simply say that she got money from her workers,” said Singh.
Earlier, the Centre rejects Mayawati’s demand for an SPG (special protection group) cover. Congress managers believe she wants the SPG cover more to lift her political status than for protection.
Strange bed fellows of 1997 inching closer ?
There are reports that the BJP and the BSP, which had forged alliances in 1997 and 2002, may be inching closer to each other again.
The BJP national leadership, happy at Mayawati’s statement that the Congress has always been an anti-Dalit party, has asked state unit leaders to keep on hold any movement against the BSP government in Uttar Pradesh. On the record, however, BJP state unit president R.R. Tripathi has denied any secret deal with the BSP.
Observers say Mayawati’s recommendation of a CBI probe in the communal CD case is largely seen as a breather for BJP president Rajnath Singh, whose name figures prominently in the FIR. In the past nine months, she has handed over six cases to the CBI but none has been taken up by the central investigative agency so far.
Congress spokesperson Akhilesh Pratap Singh says, “No such recommendation has been forwarded to the CBI. Mayawati believes in a carrot-and-stick policy. She threatened the BJP by announcing that they would be charge-sheeted. The BJP shelved all its anti-government programmes when Mayawati claimed she was recommending a CBI probe. We believe that these two parties are exploring a possibility to forge an alliance at the Centre because the BJP knows that it has no other option.”
The meeting between Satish Chandra Mishra, the BSP’s Brahmin face, and Shiv Sena’s Manohar Joshi in Mumbai in November has also come to light.
“Going by the line of action the BSP has been following, I believe that in the absence of any real third front, the BJP can easily be its bedfellow in 2009,” said Pramod Kumar, a history professor at Lucknow University and a political writer. “The way she is sparing the BJP and attacking the UPA makes it apparent that she is thinking in terms of an alliance. Her party gained ground in UP by forging an alliance with the BJP in 1997 and 2002. She may repeat this at the Centre if her party doesn’t gain sufficient seats.”
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