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Samajwadi Party to go it alone in Madhya Pradesh

Gargi Parsai

Declares first list of 111 candidates for the assembly elections

NEW DELHI: The Samajwadi Party on Friday released the first list of 111 candidates for the 230-member Madhya Pradesh assembly.

Declaring that the party will go it alone in the State, party general secretary and spokesman Amar Singh said, “We have decided not to ally with the Congress in Madhya Pradesh. We had earlier spoken to all leaders concerned including Ahmed Patel, former Chief Minister Digvijay Singh and PCC Chief Suresh Pachauri for a tie-up in the State, but did not get a clear indication from them.”

Asked if the presence of SP on all seats would not impact secular votes, Mr. Singh said the burden of keeping secular votes intact did not lie with smaller parties alone. “The Congress is the larger party, it should have taken some steps.” Claiming that the SP was “as strong in M.P., as the Congress was in U.P.,” he said his party will contest as many seats as it could. To a question, Mr. Amar Singh said no meeting had been scheduled with the Congress for seat sharing arrangement in Uttar Pradesh after two rounds of talks. “We cannot give away seats of our sitting MLAs. For the rest, things are yet to be worked out. We are ready for talks.” He said even if things did not work out in U.P. the SP would not put up a candidate in Rae Bareli and Amethi Parliamentary constituencies.

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