Mainpuri Ki Main: In Muyalam Singh's bastion, Mayawati underlined she is the queen
Mulayam Singh Yadav asked SP workers to show respect to Mayawati. Akhilesh Yadav said the SP will never forget her favours. Mayawati reigned supreme over a political present which includes the dreadful 'Guest House incident' past.
Twenty four years after being surrounded by Samajwadi Party workers in the State Guest House in Lucknow — with 200 people trying to break into the room where she hid herself — Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati has turned the tables on SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav.
In Uttar Pradesh’s Mainpuri, Mulayam asked SP workers to 'always show respect' towards Mayawati.
As Mulayam heaped praises on Mayawati, the latter kept smiling, clearly enjoying the turning of the tide.
Mulayam said, “Aaj Mayawati aayi hain. Unka ham swagat karte hain, aadar karte hain. Mayawati ji ka bahut samaan karna hamesha, kyunki samay jab bhi aaya hai Mayawati ji ne hamara saath diya hai. Hamen khushi hai hamare samarthan ke liye wo aayi hain. (Today Mayawati is here. We welcome her, respect her. You must show immense respect towards her because whenever we have been in need, Mayawati ji has stood by us. We are happy she is here to support us).”
Son Akhilesh Yadav, who was the last to speak, said, “Netaji ne keh diya hai ham Mayawati ji ka ehsaan kabhi nahi bhulenge. (Netaji has said it we will never forget Mayawati’s favours).”
#MulayamSinghYadav, #Mayawati share stage in Mainpuri. Watch #SpeechAnalytica live as India Today's experts decode Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati's speeches : https://t.co/4fqxBVUizL(@Rahulshrivstv , @javedmansari , @srijanapiya17 , @prernakaul ) pic.twitter.com/29IjAu6Tdu
— India Today (@IndiaToday) April 19, 2019
Mainpuri is one of the few seats in Uttar Pradesh where the BJP has never won.
Even during the Modi wave of 2014, the BJP candidate could poll only about a third of the number of votes Mulayam received.
In 2014, Mulayam polled 5.95 lakh votes and defeated the BJP’s Shatrughan Singh Chauhan by a margin of more than 36% votes. BSP came third.
Mulayam has repeatedly contested from Mainpuri as his second seat — only to vacate it later in favour of a family member. The BJP was badly defeated in the by-election too by Mulayam’s grandson, Tej Pratap Singh, by more than three lakh votes. Mulayam vacated the seat as he decided to represent Azamgarh Lok Sabha constituency.
Mulayam thus doesn’t really need Mayawati’s support to win from the constituency — but Mayawati is important to SP elsewhere.
It was with Mayawati’s support that the SP won the by-elections in Gorakhpur and Phulpur. After the trouncing the SP received from BJP in the 2017 Assembly elections, the former is fighting a battle for survival.
But the same elections also saw BSP restricted to just 19 seats.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, BSP drew a blank — the SP managed to win 5 out of the 80 seats up for grabs.
And yet, it is Mayawati who is ruling the roost today in this alliance — and that shows her political acumen.
While both parties need the alliance, from Day 1 (January 12), when this alliance was stitched, Mayawati has appeared to be enjoying the upper hand.
The BSP supremo used the Mainpuri stage to launch an attack on Prime Minister Modi now, saying that the alliance with the SP — despite, she didn't omit to mention, the ‘Guest House kaand’ — was in the larger interests of the nation.
With the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probing serious disproportionate assets cases against Mayawati, she knows her elbow room is limited. The only way to increase that elbow room is to increase her seat tally in UP. The best strategy to win any gain is to play on the front foot. Mayawati is doing exactly that in UP, forcing the SP onto the back foot with the Yadav father-son duo showering praises on her 24 years after reportedly sending goons-cum-party workers to 'teach her a lesson'.
No Bollywood potboiler can match what’s cooking in UP now.