The Rashtriya Janata Dal will unconditionally support the Samajwadi Party in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections as it stands the chance to defeat Yogi Adityanath-led Bharatiya Janata Party government there.

“Our party president Lalu Prasad ji has decided to give unconditional support to former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav in the Uttar Pradesh elections. Only his party SP can defeat the BJP,” RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav said on Monday.

“Akhilesh has done much work in Uttar Pradesh while he was the chief minister there and we are sure the public will bless him with votes,” he added while talking to media persons after attending the first day of the winter session of the legislative Assembly.

Tejashwi, the leader of Opposition, explained that his party would continue the Bengal Assembly polls experiment where it extended unconditional support to Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamul Congress in the Assembly elections earlier this year, because it “knew she would defeat the BJP”.

Incidentally, the RJD, though in the Opposition, is the largest party in Bihar with 75 seats in the 243-member Assembly. It has some influence in the eastern parts of Uttar Pradesh, particularly among the Yadavs.

The party had extended support to the SP in 2017 also, but the BJP swept to power. It had contested four seats and lost on all of them in the 2012 Uttar Pradesh elections.

Tejashwi asserted that Asaduddin Owaisi and his AIMIM would not have any influence in the Uttar Pradesh elections.

“It (AIMIM) contested the polls in Bihar in 2020 and did not have much impact. We emerged as the single largest party,” he said.

The youngest son of Lalu held chief minister Nitish Kumar responsible for stagnant development in the state despite being a part of the so-called ‘double engine government’ (rule of the same alliance in the state and the Centre).

“Nitish gave only promises to the people without fulfilling a single one. Nobody knows what work has been done in Rs 24,000 crore Hariyali (greenery) Mission. The scheme to provide tap water to every household has become a scheme to provide money to every official and minister,” Tejashwi said.

The RJD leader alleged that Bihar has become numero uno in the country in crime, corruption, migration and unemployment during Nitish’s regime.

“Our state is ranked at the bottom of most of the important indices as per Niti Aayog. The poor are dying here after drinking poisonous liquor. It is a surprise how liquor crosses border and travels across four to five districts without any hindrance,” Tejashwi said.

Tejashwi also dared Nitish to answer why Bihar is the most backward state in the country and where is the missing Rs 2 lakh crore as pointed out by the CAG (comptroller and auditor general) report. He asked the chief minister to reply during the ongoing winter session of the legislature that will continue till Friday.