Akhilesh vows to make SP a national party, plans yatra
LUCKNOW: Recalling his ‘Kranti Rath Yatra’ that led to he becoming Uttar Pradesh chief minister in 2012, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav said he will make SP a national party and may take out a nationwide rath yatra to achieve the objective.
Speaking on the Samajwadi Party Pension Yojana, Akhilesh asked chief minister Yogi Adityanath to call a cabinet meet on Monday and re-introduce the scheme so that women could buy sweaters for their school-going children “that the government could not provide till now”.
“What can one expect from the government that failed to provide even sweaters to children? The BJP is the biggest party in the country with crores of members. Had each member of the party either weaved or provided a sweater, then none of the children would have been without sweaters,” he said while addressing news persons here on Sunday. On the incident of potato throwing by “distressed farmers” outside the CM’s house and Vishan Bhawan, Akhilesh said: “The government took action against cops on being negligent in duty. But the government is not looking at its own negligence that forced the farmers to do what they did.”
Referring to Adityanath’s Himachal Pradesh poll rallies, Akhilesh said: “He had announced there that government made arrangements for better prices to potato farmers. What happened to that?”
The SP chief took a dig at the BJP on the issue of colouring in saffron the UP Haj Committee office’s boundary wall in Lucknow, saying they turned jittery and “overnight restored the original cream colour”.
“The government should concentrate on changing the heart of people by doing development and welfare works rather than changing colours of buildings,” he said. When asked about SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav’s comment that he will contest Lok Sabha polls from his original Mainpuri seat, Akhilesh said: “He will contest the polls from whichever seat he wishes to. The entire party and I will rally behind him for his victory”.
Mulayam had contested Mainpuri and Azamgarh seats in 2014 Lok Sabha polls. He won both but vacated Mainpuri to let his grand-nephew Tej Pratap Singh Yadav contest and win it.
“I know from where Tej Pratap will contest in that case,” he said. When asked about former Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad Yadav going to jail, Akhilesh expressed solidarity with him and said: “BJP did injustice to him.” Lalu had openly supported Akhilesh on stage during in the silver jubilee convention of Samajwadi Party in Lucknow in November 2016 and had asked Mulayam to crown him the national president.
On the plan to introduce toll tax on expressways even on small vehicles by the BJP government, he said: “When we return to power, our government will exempt all vehicles that cost under Rs 20 lakh from toll tax.”