Even as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union home minister Amit Shah will be in Uttar Pradesh, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has announced two legs of his ‘Rath Yatra’ around the same time. The political battle ahead of the assembly election is heating up with Congress and BSP also active on the ground.
Earlier, too, Akhilesh had announced the third leg of his Rath Yatra on November 13 from Gorakhpur, the hometown of chief minister Yogi Adityanath. Interestingly, the CM and Shah will be in Akhilesh’s parliamentary constituency Azamgarh on the day.
Now, after the announcement that Prime Minister Modi will be inaugurating the Purvanchal expressway on November 16, the SP has announced the fourth leg of the Rath Yatra on the same day and, that too, in the same region. Akhilesh will embark on the journey from Ghazipur to Azamgarh.
The question, however, arises whether the SP has deliberately announced these two legs of the yatra on days coinciding with PM Modi and Shah’s visits. The SP is saying it had already planned the route and dates of Rath Yatra much in advance.
Speaking to News18, SP spokesperson Abdul Hafiz Gandhi said, “We had planned our campaigns long ago. Our national president is touring every part of Uttar Pradesh. Its election time and, hence, programmes of different political parties may happen on the same dates. We are concentrating on our poll preparedness. Samajwadi Party is the main contender for 2022. We are getting excellent responses from the people. Leaders of different political parties are joining our party. We will certainly form a government in the coming season.”
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati at a press conference on November 9 had alleged that SP and BJP were playing a “fixed game”. The BSP chief had also alleged SP and BJP were “casteist and communal” and were fulfilling each other’s aspirations by deliberately “polarising” the upcoming polls.
Attacking SP and BJP, Mayawati had said, “People of UP should also be alert as the BJP is trying to deviate people from the failures of the government. They are raising issues like Ayodhya to polarise the elections. Both the parties have fixed the match as they want to benefit from each other. However, people are now aware of this. The BSP believes that people will not take this anymore. Both SP and BJP are communal and casteist and they complement each other. When the SP is in power, the BJP gets strong but when the BSP is in power, the BJP gets weak.”
Political experts, however, said such moves were not “coincidences” and were “deliberate”. Senior journalist and political commentator Parvez Ahmad said, “This is not any coincidence that programmes of the SP are clashing with the BJP’s. The motive behind this move seems to slowly position the SP as the main contender against the BJP in the 2022 UP assembly polls. Also, in my opinion, this move will help the Samajwadi Party in consolidating Muslim votes. If Muslim votes get divided, then its game over for Akhilesh Yadav. This is a step to send a message to Muslims that it’s only the SP that can defeat the BJP. This is part of the SP’s politics and nothing is coincidence. There is no doubt that Muslim votes will consolidate on the side strong enough to defeat the BJP.”
He added, “Speaking about the BSP, it has Dalit votes but not the entire chunk. Barring a few seats in western Uttar Pradesh, it seems that Mayawati is out of mainstream politics for now. Meanwhile, the Congress is being active on the ground but its fight is not for 2022 but for 2024.”
The assembly election is due early next year along with Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur. The BJP unseated the SP in 2017, bagging a whopping 312 seats in the 403-seat assembly, while the latter had to be content with just 47.
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