The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Sindhia joins Bahujan Samaj Party

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Dec 22, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Sindhia joins Bahujan Samaj Party

Special Correspondent

Not to use the new party’s platform to criticise JD(S), Congress

P.G.R. Sindhia

BANGALORE: The former Minister P.G.R. Sindhia has said that he has joined the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) without aspiration for any position in the party and that he would desist from using the party’s platform for criticising the Janata Dal (Secular) leaders and the previous government.

Addressing presspersons, Mr. Sindhia said he would formally join the BSP at a rally at the Palace Grounds here on Sunday which would be attended by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and BSP supremo Mayawati. About five lakh people from all districts are expected to participate in the rally, he said.

The former Minister, who held various portfolios in several governments in the past, said the Janata Dal was a divided house and the party had faced many splits since the early 1990s. He would not utilise the BSP’s platform to criticise leaders of the Janata Dal (Secular) and the Congress. Since the Congress support base has been declining and the people dislike the BJP’s communal agenda, the BSP would emerge as a major political force in the coming days, Mr. Sindhia said.

The former MLA from Kanakapura said after serving in the Janata Parivar for 35 years, he had decided to join the BSP to strengthen the voice of Dalits, backward classes and the poor belonging to upper castes. He accepted the BSP’s ideology and decided to work to strengthen the party as a loyal party worker under the leadership of Ms. Mayawati. “The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister should become Prime Minister in the larger interest of the country,” Mr. Sindhia said.

He said several leaders would join the BSP in the coming days. Though he had friends in the Congress, he was not interested to join that party for several reasons, Mr. Sindhia claimed.

State BSP president B. Gopal said the party would not enter into an electoral tie-up with any party and would contest elections on its own.

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