Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party, which was part of the Third Front in the Lok Sabha elections, on Tuesday announced unconditional outside support of its 21 MPs to the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government.
Acknowledging that the UPA will be called by the President to form the next government, she told a meeting of party leaders that BSP has taken the decision keeping in view the present situation and in its objective of keeping BJP out of power.
The BSP supremo said that on the day the results of elections were out, she had telephonically congratulated Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi on the UPA victory.
The prime minister, Mayawati said, called her on Sunday evening seeking her party's positive approach towards strengthening secular forces.
She said the party's national executive and parliamentary board met on Tuesday morning and discussed these issues before deciding on giving unconditional support to the new government from outside.
In the elections, the UPA coalition got 261 seats just 11 short of the magic figure of 272 required for an absolute majority in the 543-member Lok Sabha. Of this Congress alone got 206 seats.
Apart from BSP, the Janata Dal-Secular has also announced support of its three MPs.
The Rashtriya Janata Dal and Samajwadi Party, which fought Congress in the elections, have backed the new government. The RJD has four MPs while the SP has 23 MPs.