Lucknow: The Samajwadi Party proposal to form a Bihar pattern grand alliance in Uttar Pradesh to defeat the Bhartiya Janta Party has suffered a setback as the Congress which was one of the beneficiaries in the neighbouring state has not shown any inclination to join it.
In fact, the state party president, Raj Babbar , has gone to the extent of saying that there is no justification for it in the current situation. Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar who was one of the votaries of grand alliance against the “ communal forces” too does not seem keen for it the state.
Though last minute effort is likely to be made by this evening he has so far declined to attend the silver jubilee function of the SP scheduled to be held on Saturday where alliance proposal was to be discussed further with like-minded parties. Instead of Kumar Sharad Yadav who is playing second fiddle in the party now is likely to take part in the big bash.
The other party, Rashtriya Lok Dal, which has its areas of influence in the western part of the state and which could join the alliance too has not given any clear hint of its participation. The party president Ajit Singh, however, who has joined hands with Nitish recenty to unite old socialists, is likely to take part.
The grand alliance on Bihar lines is also unlikely because in Bihar all the major non-BJP parties had favoured the alliance, while in UP, the Bahujan Samaj Party has already declared that it will go it alone.
None other the Congress, however, has come out so openly against the proposed alliance . Raj Babbar, in fact, is rating recent party vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s Yatra in the state so highly that he believes that the party will do better in the state even alone. “ Wherever Rahulji went he got overwhelming peoples’ support. So there is no need for the party for any alliance” , he said.
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He is partly not in favour of the alliance because of the current going-on in the Samajwadi Party and the Yadav family. The feud in the family has come out in the open. May be it is because of this that some non-BJP parties’ leader have even advocated in favour of alliance with state chief minister Akhilesh Yadav and not his father Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Akhilesh has been so far out of the alliance talks which are currently being held by Mulayam and his brother Shivpal Singh Yadav. Akhilesh has himself said so during his Rath Yatra on the first day. “ I do not know about any alliance” he told a crowd which had collected in the Yatra route. Shivpal too has left everything to Mulayam in this regard. Will he create a miracle?
Also Read: SP seems to be inclined to grand alliance proposal on Bihar line now