Its official now: Samajwadi Party will ally with the Congress

Lucknow: The Samajwadi Party will contest the forthcoming assembly election in Uttar Pradesh in the company of the Congress and some regional parties. The formal announcement is likely to be made in a day or two here itself.

Ending all speculations in this regard, Akhilesh told some media persons on Tuesday " I am not going to Delhi. The alliance will be announced in Lucknow soon". The speculation in this connection had begun soon after wife of Akhilesh had met Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, daughter of Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

The announcement was delayed because of family feud and uncertainty over the party symbol which was allotted to Akhilesh faction by the Election Commission on Monday.

The Congress has also confirmed the news. Party spokesman Bheem Afzal said in response to a query, “the party is ready to ally with the SP in the interest of the state".

According to some party insiders, the ruling SP has agreed to leave 100 to 105 seats for the Congress out of which the latter will contest 89 on its own symbol and the rest on the SP symbol, “It is not something new. This experiment has been done in the past by the NDA", one of them said.

With Akhilesh at the helm and restoration of peace in the family, the grand alliance proposal has been also revised. The Ajit Singh led Rashtriya Lok Dal has already favoured an alliance with the SP. Some other regional and small parties may join it too.

The SP is believed to have offered 20 seats to Ajit Singh but he is reported to have been insisting on eight more. A compromise is likely to be reached soon.

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