BSP likely to field Maya’s brother in RS poll
LUCKNOW : The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) is likely to field Anand Kumar, younger brother of party chief Mayawati, as its candidate for the biennial election to Rajya Sabha slated on March 23, a party leader familiar with the matter said.
A senior BSP leader said by sending her brother to the Rajya Sabha, Mayawati wished to send a clear message to party workers that Anand will be her successor. The BSP chief, who had resigned from the Rajya Sabha in July last year, made it clear at a meeting of party leaders last week that she will not contest the election and wished to work for strengthening the party organization, he said.
Mayawati had made Anand
› Behenji will go for a tacit understanding with the SP and Congress only for herself or for a family member BSP LEADER
her heir apparent by appointing him national vice-president of the party in April last year. He has been attending party meetings and sharing the dais with Mayawati at public meetings.
“Behenji will go for such a tacit understanding with the SP and Congress only for herself or for a family member,” said another BSP leader who did not wish to be named.
HT tried to contact Anand Kumar at the BSP national office in Delhi and the state unit office in Lucknow for his views but there was no response.
The BSP has 19 MLAs in the legislative assembly and this is not enough for it to send its candidate to the Upper House on its own.
A candidate requires at least 37 first-preference votes to make it. Mayawati made it clear on Sunday that she had clinched a deal with the SP to send a BSP candidate to the Rajya Sabha.
“The SP will support the BSP candidate in the Rajya Sabha election. In turn, the the BSP will support SP in the legislative council election,” she said.
The BSP also announced support to the SP candidates in the Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha by-polls.
Mayawati made it clear that BSP had a tacit understanding with SP for the Rajya Sabha and Legislative Council election. It was not an alliance for the 2019 Lok Sabha election, she said.
While announcing the appointment of Anand as the party’s national vice-president last year, Mayawati had said that he lived in Delhi and will handle the party organization work.
She also offered her support to Congress for a Rajya Sabha seat in Madhya Pradesh in return for the seven Congress MLAs in UP backing the BSP candidate. Senior Congress leader Pramod Tiwari welcomed the SP-BSP alliance, stating his party had been calling for opposition unity against the BJP.
The Rajya Sabha term of BSP’s Munkad Ali expires in April, but his chances dimmed after the party expelled his son on the charge of committing atrocities on Dalits.