Karnataka assembly poll results may be an acid test of a possible SP-BSP pact in Uttar Pradesh ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha election.
With exit polls projecting HD Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal (Secular), which contested Karnataka polls in alliance with BSP, as the kingmaker, SP is keeping a close watch on the developments. If JD(S) and BSP join hands with BJP to form a coalition government in Karnataka, the prospects of the SP-BSP alliance in UP can run into trouble. Both SP and BSP see BJP as their arch rival.
Senior SP leaders believe that Mayawati will not join the BJP-JD(S) alliance at the cost of unsettling her party in UP. “UP is the home turf of BSP and the party’s presence in the state is no match to what it can hope to gain politically as an alliance partner with JD(S) in Karnataka,” a senior SP leader told TOI on Sunday. JD(S) has so far maintained that it will not go with any of the two national parties – BJP and Congress – to form the government in Karnataka. Reports say Congress may try to win over JD (S) by pushing for a Dalit CM if the two parties have to come together to form a coalition government.
The Maha-Thag-Bandhan of parties like Congress, JD(S), BSP, SP etc. basically has NO colour, NO ism or philosophy BUT possess the only agenda to befool common people, win elections by hook-or-crook a…
Analysts, however, don’t rule out the possibility of Mayawati, under CBI lens for alleged irregularities in sale of sugar mills when she was UP CM, joining the BJP-JD (S) coalition government in Karnataka. In 2002, Mayawati became CM along with seven BJP MLAs as members of her cabinet. But things have changed since then.
SP MLC Udaiveer Singh, one of the architects of the SP-BSP pact for Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls, said: “BSP has to take a call in Karnataka. At present, there is no reason why the SP-BSP alliance will not continue till 2019 Lok Sabha polls and beyond.”
