ELECTIONS '98 COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ARCHIVES

Kanshiram says he spurned BJP's overtures in UP

Stung by the reverses suffered in the assembly elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party has opened a channel of communication with former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati offering to revive the tie-up with her party, but Bahujan Samaj Party chief Kanshiram rejected the move out of hand.

When the BSP did not think it fit to forge an alliance with the Congress in the recent elections to the Madhya Pradesh assembly, the question of his party entering into any understanding with the BJP was out of the question, Kanshiram said in New Delhi.

Talking to newspersons, Kanshiram said while senior BJP leader from UP, Lalji Tandon spoke to Mayawathi three days back in this connection, some emissaries of the central BJP leadership also got in touch with him. "There is no concrete offer but we know their mind. The BJP wants to forge an all-India alliance with the BSP," he said.

The BJP's overtures to the party assume significance in the wake of reports that some of its alliance partners in UP are flexing their muscles, especially after the rout faced by the party in the three northern states in the recent assembly elections. The public posturing by the alliance partners may affect the stability of the Kalyan Singh government.

The BSP leader reiterated that his party had decided against entering into an alliance with any party, including the Third Front.

Kanshiram said the biggest political fallout of the recent assembly elections was the realisation on the part of the BJP that triangular fights, which helped it in Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere in the Hindi heartland, were now harming it. Results from MP had brought about a sea-change in the BJP's stance towards his party, he said.

The BSP leader said the party's poll strategy from now on would be to enter into limited understanding with the Congress to give them some Dalit votes here and there so that the latter gets the leverage to cut into the upper caste votebank of the BJP.

The strategy, which was tested in Madhya Pradesh, would work well in UP too, going by the performance of the Congress in the recent by-elections in Agra East. In the Baniya-dominated constituency, the Congress which finished second, was able to secure the support of the Baniyas, a section of the Brahmins and two-thirds of the Muslims. While the Jatav (Dalit) votebank remained with the BSP, about 30 pc of the Muslims voted for his party, he claimed.

The minorities, Kanshiram said, were no longer bitter with the BSP since the party is totally opposed to the BJP. "We are not only opposed to the BJP but have been found to be effective against that party," he said in a subtle dig at the Samajwadi Party for claiming to be the sole representative of the minorities.

Replying to questions, Kanshiram said the BSP will not permit a bipolar situation to emerge in Indian politics, though both the BJP and the Congress are keen that they alone should be the main players on the national scene. To cut the Congress to size in both UP and Bihar is no problem, he maintained.

The BSP leader, however, admitted that his strategy in Madhya Pradesh misfired since his party failed to secure the targeted 25 to 30 seats which could have helped to rein in the Congress. The BSP desired that the Congress tally in MP assembly should not exceed 150 seats in the 320-member assembly so that the Dalit party could call the shots. But the BSP ended up with only 11 seats.

To review the failure, he has called a meeting of the state unit leaders and the party candidates at Satna on December 9 and 10. One reason for its poor performance could be that the party fielded the same candidates and decided to leave to the people to decide their worth he said.

Kanshiram said the Congress had proposed a full-fledged alliance with the BSP for the Madhya Pradesh assembly elections. The party could have managed to contest 100 seats in alliance with the Congress since the last offer was for around 80 seats.

He spurned the offer since a Congress-BSP alliance could have helped the BJP to come to power in Bhopal. Explaining the rationale, Kanshiram said while his party could transfer its votes to the Congress, the latter's votes would have gone to the BJP wherever there was a BSP candidate. He therefore preferred a triangular contest but chose to contest around 90 seats. Consequently, the BSP's voting percentage dropped to 5.7 per cent as against 8.5 per cent during the parliamentary elections.

The BSP leader said he did not mind minor losses since the strategy paid rich dividends in ensuring that the BJP lost in all the three states. ''It was my desire that the BJP is defeated in these states and the results should cause the fall of the Vajpayee government at the Centre,'' he said.

Uttar Pradesh, he said, has been the BSP's laboratory for political experiments during the last ten years. In UP, the BSP saw the fall of the Congress and the rise of the BJP. He said the BSP was one of the major contributory factors for the growth of the BJP.

UNI

Assembly Election '98

Tell us what you think of this report