Rajbhar says SP-SBSP alliance will support Mukhtar Ansari in UP assembly polls

Ballia: Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP) president Om Prakash Rajbhar on Thursday said his alliance with the SP will support jailed BSP MLA Mukhtar Ansari in the upcoming 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. Quoting sources, IANS reported that Rajbhar has offered Mukhtar to contest the 2022 Assembly elections on an SBSP symbol.

Rajbhar, who forged a tie-up recently with the Samajwadi Party for the UP assembly polls, had met Ansari in Banda jail, prompting the ruling BJP to accuse him of practising the "politics of appeasement". According to a report by IANS, Rajbhar was accompanied by Abbas and Umar, the two sons of Ansari for the meeting which took place on Tuesday.

Rajbhar told PTI that the SP and the SBSP alliance will support Mukhtar Ansari in the assembly polls.

"It depends on Mukhtar whether he contests in alliance with the SP and the SBSP or as an independent candidate," he added.

When asked whether Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav will be ready to support him, Rajbhar said, "If he has to form a government, he should not have any problem in giving support. When he can forge an alliance with Mayawati, then there will be no problem in supporting Mukhtar."

Mukhtar's brother Sigbatullah Ansari has joined the Samajwadi Party (SP) but Akhilesh Yadav is apparently averse to bringing the mafia don into his party fold since that would invite unnecessary controversy and flak from other political circles.

The tiff between Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle Shivpal began in 2016 when the latter allowed the merger of Mukhtar Ansari's Qaumi Ekta Dal into the SP. According to reports, Akhilesh Yadav and Rajbhar have hit upon the formula under which Mukhtar Ansari could contest the Assembly polls on an SBSP ticket and he would automatically get Samajwadi support since SP and SBSP have already announced their alliance for the elections

Rajbhar had earlier termed Mukhtar as an "old friend" saying that he knows Mukhtar for the past 19 years. He used to go to meet him in Punjab jail, even as a minister in the Uttar Pradesh's BJP government.

In a statement on Rajbhar's meeting with Ansari, Uttar Pradesh government spokesperson and Cabinet minister Siddharth Nath Singh on Wednesday said, "It was not just a meeting between Rajbhar and mafia Mukhtar Ansari but an evidence of the politics of appeasement that the BJP often talks about." The SBSP had held a rally in Mau on October 27 with SP president Yadav too participating in it and announcing a poll alliance with Rajbhar's party, which is said to have a considerable influence over his community voters in eastern Uttar Pradesh.

The SBSP, which had contested the 2017 assembly elections in alliance with the BJP, has four MLAs at present. Rajbhar was also made a Cabinet minister in the Adityanath government but due to differences with the chief minister, he quit the government.

In September this year, BSP supremo Mayawati had said her party will make efforts to not field 'bahubali' (strongmen) or mafia candidates in the next year's Uttar Pradesh polls and announced that jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari will not be given a party ticket from Mau again.

Mukhtar wields considerable influence in nearly a dozen Assembly segments in eastern Uttar Pradesh. The coming together of Muslims, Rajbhar and Yadav votes in the region would undoubtedly prove to be a winning combination and could upset the ruling BJP's calculations in the area.

Mukhtar Ansari, who is presently a BSP MLA, has reportedly agreed to the proposal since party president Mayawati has already said that she would not give a ticket to the Ansari brothers.

Mukhtar's elder brother, Afzal Ansari, is a BSP MP at present.