BSP spurns Owaisi’s attempts to form alliance before UP polls

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) leader Asaduddin Owaisi’s attempts to firm up a pre-poll alliance with Mayawati ahead of next year’s assembly Uttar Pradesh polls have collapsed.

“We had sent feelers for an arrangement with the BSP and had even met Swami Prasad Maurya. But there was no response from that party and Maurya himself quit the BSP. The question (of alliance) doesn’t arise,” AIMIM’s UP president Shaukat Ali told Hindustan Times.

After the failure of his “go-italone” policy during last year’s Bihar polls, Owaisi has started negotiating possible tie-ups with small Muslim and Dalit groups including Dr Mohammed Ayub’s Peace Party and Mukhtar Ansari’s Quami Ekta Dal.

The AIMIM’s UP unit had last year indicated that it will contest from around 100 of the state’s 403 seats. The Hyderabadbased party has now not only scaled down its numbers but is also willing to play junior partner to any secular formation in order to prevent Muslim/Dalit votes from getting splintered.

Sources said the AIMIM is in the process of identifying “winnable Muslim and Dalit” seats.

“All these so-called secular parties (the BSP, SP and the Congress) treat us as untouchables and brand us as communal. This is because they do not want Muslims to have a political party of their own. Hence, they would promote somebody (Muslim) who is a ‘dealer’ and not a leader,” Ali said. “We are working out the (seat sharing) details and would launch our mass public contact programme sometime in the third-week of September,” he added.

“Our party’s UP unit is discussing alliance possibilities. It is early days yet and nothing has been decided so far,” Owaisi told HT.