BSP hopes for the best; meeting at Maya house today

LUCKNOW: The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) on Wednesday organised a dinner for its 19 MLAs to fine-tune its strategy for the Rajya Sabha election to be held on March 23.

The BSP has fielded former MLA Bhimrao Ambedkar and hopes to win the support of the SP, the Congress and the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD).

People familiar with the development said leader of BSP legislature party Lalji Verma, state unit president Ramachal Rajbhar, former Speaker Sukhdev Rajbhar and other MLAs attended the dinner at the residence of BSP MLA from Rasra assembly seat in Ballia Uma Shankar Singh.

A BSP leader said the dinner was organised to discuss the strategy for Rajya Sabha election. The leaders also collected information about the turnout of the Samajwadi Party MLAs in the dinner organised by the party president Akhilesh Yadav as well as the meeting of Congress MLAs held at the UPCC office, he added.

A meeting of BSP MLAs will be held at the residence of party president Mayawati on Thursday, he said.

The BSP has 19 MLAs and requires 18 additional votes to sail through. Party strategists hope that with the support of the legislators of the SP (9), Congress (7), RLD (1) and one independent MLA, it can easily win the seat.

Earlier this month, the BSP supported SP candidates in Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls.