Struggling for survival in politics, Mayawati has made her nephew Akash Anand national coordinator of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to send a message across Uttar Pradesh that younger leadership was at place to take over the reins in future.

The four-time UP chief minister is facing the worst time of her political career as the BSP has been reduced to a party of just one MLA out of 403 in a state where she had 206 seats in 2007 and got 36.27 per cent of the total vote share. The vote share of the BSP is 12.88 per cent in the recently concluded Assembly election.

She has made three senior leaders of the party — Munkad Ali, Raj Kumar Gautam and Vijay Pratap — zonal coordinators of the BSP and asked them to report to Akash, who is son of her younger brother Anand Kumar.

The BSP boss has also dissolved all the district-level units of the party.

“She has asked Akash and party’s general secretary Satish Chandra Mishra to review the BSP’s district-wise works every week and identify those who were active even after the defeat to give them responsibilities. Obviously, there is something grossly wrong with us. If you look at the BSP, you will find that it was working in the same manner for the last 38 years. Since Behenji (Maya) became CM four times and formed a majority government in 2007, we believed that all would be well,” a BSP leader said on condition of anonymity.

“In 2014 Lok Sabha elections, we had no seat and 10 in 2019 when we allied with the Samajwadi Party. We still have a cadre base and organisational structure. Mayawati and most of us are of the view that we should work on new leadership and agendas,” said the BSP leader.

Sources in the BSP said they were unanimous in several meetings held in last two weeks that Dalit-Muslim alliance was necessary.

“It is not difficult if we work properly because the Muslims are disillusioned of the SP, which has used their votes only. They voted for the SP in the recent Assembly elections in UP only because they wanted to defeat the BJP,” another BSP leader quoted Maya saying in last three meetings.

“Maya has said many time that we need to work for the Muslims to instil confidence in them for the BSP,” he said.

Mayawati tweeted in Hindi on Tuesday, “The friendship of the SP and the BJP is in open as they made it Hindu-Muslim in the election by creating an atmosphere of fear and terror. It confused the Muslim community and they committed the mistake of voting for the SP. It is possible to defeat the BJP (in future) by correcting this.”

The observers say that there are 21 per cent Dalits and about 19 per cent Muslims in UP. Obviously this combination is sufficient for victory of the BSP in future elections in the state.

Ghazipur fire: Cops register FIR against unknown persons

Delhi police have registered an FIR against unknown persons in connection with the fire that broke out at the Ghazipur dumping yard in east Delhi, officials said on Tuesday.

The fire that broke out on Monday raged in some pockets even after 30 hours.

An FIR has been registered under several sections of the Indian Penal Code against unknown people, a senior police officer said.

PTI