Mutual admiration between Mayawati & Home Minister Amit Shah

Uttar Pradesh –Uttar Pradesh is most crucial state as Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is bidding to win back the power in currently ongoing Assembly elections in the state. With just few weeks left for the election result to be announced, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and former Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Mayawati’s “mutual praise” and raised up the speculations over possible “santh – ganth” (alliance).

“It is his badappan (magnanimity) that he has acknowledged the truth.” This was Mayawati’s response when asked for her comments over Shah’s recent positive assessment of her campaign. She added, “But I also want to tell him – in the three phases that have taken place in UP, the BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party) has not just received Dalit and Muslim votes but we are also getting upper caste and backward caste votes. I want to tell him that.”

Over BJP’s claim that the national party would be crossing 300 mark in 403 seat UP Assembly, Mayawati said, “Only time will tell. Who knows, the BSP may emerge the winner, instead of the BJP and Samajwadi Party.”

Taking a dig at Samajwadi Party, with whose leader Akhilesh Yadav she had partnered for a short duration before 2019 national election before splitting up later, Mayawati said, “The voters of UP have already rejected the Samajwadi Party as they know that whenever that party has come to power, there has been goonda raj (crime).”

During an interview on Tuesday, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had said that Mayawati’s presence in state’s political stage wasn’t lost and was very much significant. On being asked whether BSP winning some of the Dalit and Muslim votes would help his party in UP, Amit Shah had said, “I do not know if this would be an advantage for the BJP or a loss. It depends on the seat…it is seat specific. But it’s not true that Mayawati’s relevance is over.”