Alliance with BSP to stay, will sacrifice seats to defeat BJP in 2019, says Akhilesh Yadav

Buoyed by recent bypoll successes, former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav on Sunday said that he will continue the alliance with long-time rival Mayawati’s BSP for the 2019 general election even if it costs him few seats.

“Our alliance with BSP will continue, in 2019 even if we have to give up a few seats we will do it. We have to ensure the BJP is defeated,” Akhilesh Yadav said at a public meeting in Mainpuri.

Yadav said that he wanted to see each of the BJP candidate losing in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections. His statement came weeks after Opposition backed RLD candidate Tabassum Hasan defeated BJP’s Mriganka Singh in Kairana bypoll.

Yadav’s Samajwadi Party (SP) and Mayawati’s BSP had joined hands for the first time during Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls in Uttar Pradesh.

In the bypolls, SP candidates defeated BJP in CM Yogi Adityanath’s home constituency Gorakhpur and Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya’s Phulpur.

The BJP, however, predicted that the “Bua (Mayawati)-Babua (Akhilesh Yadav)” will finish off fighting with each other before the 2019 elections.

“Bua (Mayawati) and Babua (Akhilesh Yadav) will finish off with fighting among themselves. This isn’t an alliance based on issues. An issue-less alliance never works. They will be finished before the election (2019) comes,” UP minister Swami Prasad Maurya said on Sunday.