No alliance with AIMIM, BSP to fight solo in UP and Uttarakhand

The Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Sunday said that her party will not tie up with any other party to face elections in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. She emphasised that the political tie-up BSP has with Shiromani Akali Dal for Punjab elections.

In a series of tweets she ruled out reports that the BSP would join hands with Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM in Uttar Pradesh.

Mayawati was addressing the media reports rumouring that BSP is set to tie up with Asaduddin Owaisi-led AIMIM in Uttar Pradesh. In Punjab, BSP will contest on 20 seats and SAD will contest on 97 seats.

Mayawati tweeted that the news being broadcast in news channels that BSP and AIMIM will fight next assembly elections together is completely false, misleading, and baseless. "There is not even an iota of truth in this and the BSP vehemently denies it."

All three elections are to be held early next year.

The BSP, which stormed to power in 2007 in UP by winning 206 seats, was left with just 80 seats in 2012. In 2014, Mayawati's party did not win a single Lok Sabha seat, and in the 2017 Uttar Assembly elections, it bagged only 19 seats.

Meanwhile, NDTV reported former Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav as saying that his party would join forces with like-minded smaller parties, but no tie-up with BSP or Congress. His alliance with BSP in 2019 did not work out.

Moreover, immediately after the Lok Sabha elections, Mayawati had snapped ties with SP announcing that her party would never ally with SP again.

Yadav also added that Congress is too weak to win against BJP in Uttar Pradesh, referring to the 2019 elections. The Congress won only one out of 80 seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, he said

With BSP's support base dwindling over the years, the BJP and the Samajwadi Party have been trying to woo the Dalit voters ahead of the upcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections in 2022.

In April, Akhilesh Yadav had announced that Samajwadi Party (SP) will constitute a Baba Saheb Vahini named after Dalit icon Dr B.R. Ambedkar.

The Baba Saheb Vahini aims to bring Dalits into the Samajwadi fold and assure them protection against social exploitation.

Meanwhile BJP has now announced that it will build a memorial in the name of Ambedkar.

Citing sources, a NDTV report confirmed that, the saffron party will be contesting the Uttar Pradesh election under the leadership of Yogi Adityanath as Chief Minister and Swatantra Dev Singh as state president