Mayawati slams BJP for delay in urban body polls in UP

Hitting out at the ruling BJP, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati on Friday said had the saffron party not "wasted time" in "Sangh appeasement" by indulging in issues such as conversion, jihad and a survey of madrasas, the delay in holding the civic polls in Uttar Pradesh could have been avoided.

Addressing a meeting of the BSP office-bearers of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand at the party headquarters here, Mayawati also slammed the Congress, alleging that both the grand old party and the BJP are against reservation.

"If the intention and policy of the BJP were not to delay the Uttar Pradesh local body election and hold it in a legal manner on time, instead of wasting time in Sangh appeasement by indulging in issues like conversion, hate, jihad and madrasa survey, it would have focused on OBC reservation in the civic polls," she was quoted as saying in a statement issued by the BSP.

The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court quashed the Uttar Pradesh government's draft notification on the urban local body polls on Tuesday and ordered it to hold the elections without any reservation for the Other Backward Classes (OBCs).

"Both the Congress and the BJP are anti-reservation parties. Together, they have made the constitutional right of reservation for the uplift of SCs (Scheduled Castes) and STs (Scheduled Tribes) almost inactive and ineffective and now, the same bad, casteist, hostile attitude is being shown with the reservation for OBCs as well.

"Because of their casteist intentions, thousands of posts reserved for them (SCs, STs and OBCs) in government departments have been lying vacant for years. Even the SP's (Samajwadi Party) thinking, policy and intentions are not right on the issue," Mayawati said.

The former Uttar Pradesh chief minister instructed BSP leaders to travel to villages to raise awareness on the party's programmes from the start of the new year in view of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.