Lucknow, December 12
Ahead of the crucial 2022 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, the Samajwadi Party got a shot in the arm on Sunday when two sitting MLAs, one from the BJP and one from the BSP, joined the party at its headquarters here in presence of SP chief Akhilesh Yadav.
The legislators are Vinay Shankar Tiwari (BSP) from Chillupar Assembly seat in Gorakhpur and Digvijay Narayan alias Jai Chaubey from Khalilabad constituency in Sant Kabir Nagar.
Former chairman of the UP Legislative Council Ganesh Shankar Pandey, who was fielded by the BSP in 2010 for the post of council chairman, also joined the Samajwadi Party. Apart from these prominent leaders, a large number of Brahmins from different political parties also joined the party.
Speaking on the occasion, Tiwari termed Yadav a “popular leader” and claimed, “This (BJP) government was not formed for democracy (loktantra) but for autocracy (rajtantra), and there is a ban on free speech. This government has also started a new trend of putting its plaques on foundation stones or development work of any other government.”
The government has sown seeds of hatred and has divided the people, he alleged.
Tiwari said the government had set up big hoardings advertising its achievements but the ground reality was completely different.
“The injustice done to the Brahmin community has been the most in this government,” he said, adding that the UP government had started a “policy of encounters” in the state.
