The BJP considers "Brahmin religion", which is followed by only 10 per cent of the people, as "Hindu religion" and there exists nothing like "Hindu religion", Samajwadi Party leader Swami Prasad Maurya has said.

Maurya said the party does not consider tribals, Dalits, and other backward classes, who form the majority of Indians, as Hindus, and characterises the entire religion only with Brahmins.

In an interview with PTI, the politician also called the ruling BJP-led NDA, a "Non-Democratic Alliance", as he exuded confidence that the opposition bloc's INDIA will deliver a defeat to the two-time Narendra Modi government at the Centre in the coming general election.

"On Saturday, I was attending a 'samajik nyay sammelan' organised by the party in Azamgarh. The religion, the BJP cites, there is nothing called Hindu religion. They consider Brahmin religion as the Hindu religion," Maurya told PTI over the phone.

"When they do not consider the tribals, Dalits, and backwards as Hindus, who constitute 90 per cent of the population, then with only 10 per cent people's statement, will it become Hindu religion? This is Brahmin religion, and in order to maintain the supremacy of their religion, they despicably insult the tribals, the Dalits and the backwards," he said.

Maurya had defected from the BJP and joined the SP in 2022, a month ahead of the UP assembly elections.

The leader had last Sunday too accused the BJP of stoking communal sentiments with its support to the Gyanvapi mosque issue.

"They are looking for a temple in every mosque. This will cost them dearly. Because if they look for a temple in every mosque then people will start searching for a Buddhist monastery in every temple," Maurya had told reporters then in Lucknow.

When he was asked about how the INDIA, the opposition alliance, will be different from other regional alliances formed to defeat the BJP in the past, Maurya asserted the alliance will be different in that it will consolidate votes, which otherwise used to go to different parties.

"The BJP used to come to power with 40-42 per cent of the votes. The rest of the 60 per cent votes of the opposition used to split among different platforms. With the formation of INDIA, the votes will consolidate on a single platform," he said.

"Whenever alliances are made at the national level, be it Janata Party or Janata Dal, both of them were successful, and both had uprooted the then governments. The INDIA alliance will uproot BJP from power. To save the country, Constitution, democracy, and reservation, and to conduct a caste survey, a farewell needs to be given to the BJP in the 2024 general elections," he added.

Maurya also responded to the BJP's comparison of INDIA with the East India Company, the British conglomerate that once overwhelmed Indian trade, paving the way for the British Raj.

"A number of their schemes are named after India -- Make in India, Start-Up India, Digital India. If they say that the name of the Opposition's platform is taken from Indian Mujahideen and East India Company, then Modiji should answer from where he took 'India' that he uses in his schemes?" he said.

On the Supreme Court stay on the conviction of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in a 2019 defamation case, Maurya said that the order was a "victory of democracy" and it has increased the faith of the public in the judiciary.

On Om Prakash Rajbhar-led SBSP joining the NDA, Maurya asked, "Have the allegations, which he (Rajbhar) had levelled against the BJP, been washed away?" Maurya said barring Dara Singh Chauhan, the SP MLA who had recently resigned as MLA and joined the BJP, all BJP leaders who had left the saffron party before the 2022 Assembly elections along with him, are still with the SP. "People who compromise with the interests of their community for power, are punished by their community." Maurya said the opposition bloc aims to win 45-50 seats from UP and confine the BJP to 30-35 seats.

On a statement recently made by his daughter – BJP Lok Sabha MP Sanghamitra Maurya – that she would try to bring her father back into the BJP fold, he said his daughter was still a greenhorn in politics and knows little about her own father.

"She is still a kid in politics … whatever she said, it is her childishness," Maurya said.

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