Maya, Akhilesh seek regional leadership for nation

In a move to prevent the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance from receiving another term in office, two power giants of Uttar Pradesh, the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Samajwadi Party, on 12 January announced a formal prepoll alliance in the country’s most populous state, leaving the Congress Party to fend for itself. The political inference of the alignment, which was speedily hailed by several regional leaders, including West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, is that the final decision regarding the formation of the next government at the Centre would be determined by post poll arithmetic. Getting the PM’S post would be possible only with the tacit approval and active involvement of regional parties, which in all likelihood may corner a substantial number of seats. In other words, the expectation of Mamata, Maya and Akhilesh is that regional players would have a decisive say in who would be the next Prime Minister.

The announcement of the BSP-SP tie-up by former Chief Ministers, Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav may be a source of “sleepless” nights to the BJP, which, along with its ally, had secured 73 out of 80 seats in the 2014 Parliamentary elections from UP, with SP obtaining five and the