Shillong, May 14: The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in its strategy to bolster its electoral prospects in Uttar Pradesh and emerge as a key challenger to the BJP made the winnability factor its sole consideration to put up candidates for the Lok Sabha elections.
It did not hesitate to give tickets to candidates with a criminal background and also turncoats in these elections. The winnability factor was above all other considerations, including public perception.
BSP president Mayawati had announced in 2021 that her party would not field any criminal in elections.
However, a look at the BSP’s list of candidates shows that the party has gone back on its promise.
The BSP candidate in Bijnor, Vijendra Singh, has nine criminal cases against him, including the infamous bike bot scam.
Chaudhary Basheer, the BSP candidate from Firozabad, is known for his six marriages. He went to jail when his fourth wife complained that he had given her triple talaq.
The BSP candidate in Sitapur, Mahendra Yadav, was in BJP but left after his objectionable video went viral and the party denied him a ticket.
Shahjahanpur BSP candidate Majid Ali also has six cases registered against him.
The party has also welcomed turncoats with open arms.
Its candidate in Mainpuri, Shiv Prasad Yadav, came in from the BJP while in Farrukhabad, the BSP made Kranti Pandey its candidate. Pandey comes from a Congress background.
In Bareilly, the BSP opted for Chhotelal of the Congress but his nomination got cancelled due to technical reasons at the last moment.
The BSP candidate in Basti, initially, was Daya Shankar Pandey who was a former BJP office-bearer. The party later replaced him with Lavkush Patel.
In Faizabad too, the BSP candidate is Sachidanand Pandey who came in from BJP.
In the past too, the BSP has served as a haven for the mafia.
D.P. Yadav, Mukhtar Ansari, Dhananjay Singh, Sonu Singh, Rizwan Zaheer, Vikas Dubey, Haji Yakub Qureshi, Haji Iqbal and Sanjeev Dwivedi — all well-known criminals — have been with the BSP at one time or another. (IANS)