Stung in UP, SP slaps Cong in Gujarat

The recent thaw in relations between the Samajwadi Party and the Congress looked like history today. Mulayam Singh Yadav’s party attack...

The recent thaw in relations between the Samajwadi Party and the Congress looked like history today. Mulayam Singh Yadav’s party attacked the Congress for facilitating an easy victory for the BSP-BJP candidate in the UP Legislative Council bypoll.

Stung by the Congress’ refusal to back Yashwant Singh, a rebel BJP candidate propped up by the party, and opting to stay out of the election, SP general secretary Amar Singh said: ‘‘This episode proves there is little to choose between the Congress and the BJP.’’

‘‘We will now have to go back to our old policy of maintaining equidistance from the BJP and the Congress,’’ he said, declaring that the SP will field candidates in at least 120 Assembly seats in Gujarat. In effect, Singh was saying that the Congress could not expect to derive benefit from the little influence the SP has in the state.

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Singh said that while the Congress expected all secular forces to unite in Gujarat, it did not extend the idea to Uttar Pradesh, where the seeds of communalism were sown first. ‘‘All the while it was asking us if we had the numbers in UP. In the voting yesterday, we have shown our strength,’’ he said.

Yashwant Singh, he said, had secured 183 votes and would have won the election had the Congress, with its 25 votes, supported him. ‘‘This election has clearly exposed the Congress as a pseudo-secular party. We appeal to the minorities in Gujarat to realise that there is very little to distinguish the Congress from the BJP,’’ he added.

Singh also said that UP Governor Vishnukant Shastri, who had been saying that the Mayawati government still has 210 MLAs on its side, should realise the support the SP enjoys in the Assembly.

‘‘He should convene an emergency session of the Assembly to test the BSP-BJP government’s majority, a demand which has been made after all these days by the Congress. It (Congress) is like Kumbhakarna waking up from his slumber,’’ he said.