The widening rift in Mulayam Singh’s family will cost the ruling Samajwadi Party dearly in the upcoming Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh and some of its senior leaders are in touch with the Congress to join it, Congress chief ministerial candidate Sheila Dikshit said on Sunday.
Ms. Dikshit, a three-time Chief Minister of Delhi, said the cracks in the SP will benefit the Congress as those unhappy with the goings on in that party do not have much choice but to come to the Congress fold.
Confident of an impressive performance by the Congress in the Assembly polls in the politically crucial State where the party has been out of power for 27 years, she said some of the SP MLAs and mid-level leaders were also in touch with the Congress.
“There are a lot people wanting to come to the Congress, certainly because they cannot go to the BJP or the BSP,” she told PTI in an interview.
Asked whether some senior leaders of the SP are in touch with the Congress, 78-year-old Ms. Dikshit said they are a mixture of senior, mid-level and local leaders.
“Those who are disappointed with the reputation that SP has picked up are definitely looking for alternative and the alternative is the Congress,” she said adding “a lot” of SP MLAs are also trying to get in touch with the Congress.
“Many of them are in touch already. Openly they are not doing it now,” she said.
The SP has been grappling with internal rift mainly due to differences between party supremo Mulayam Singh’s brother Shivpal Yadav and his son, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav. Elections in the State are due early next year,
Amid the feud, Mr. Singh on Friday had said the SP’s chief ministerial candidate will be decided by party legislators after the 2017 Assembly elections, if the party manages to form government again. The announcement is seen as a setback to Akhilesh who was recently removed as president of SP’s State president.
“Of course it (rift in the SP) will help. It will be harmful for them because it is the party in power. All the scandals and differences are not going to help them,” said Ms. Dikshit.
About the Congress’ preparations for the polls, the veteran leader said the party has been revived to a great extent across the State and people’s expectations from it have now grown significantly.
Asked whether she has been selected because of her Brahmin background, Ms. Dikshit said it was one reason but the “real reason was my performance in Delhi”.
On perception that many people in Uttar Pradesh still do not relate to her, Ms. Dikshit said she was a familiar face in the State because of her performance in Delhi. “Yes, I have not been associated with U.P. politics but it is not that they do not know about me. They know that I am somebody who has done very well in Delhi.
“There must be hardly any family in U.P. which does not have somebody or the other either coming to Delhi once in a while or having shifted to Delhi. I am not an unfamiliar face. But yes the kind of familiarity of a person whose politics has been in U.P. is not there. But I do not think it will matter,” she said.
Born in a Punjabi Khatri family, Ms. Dikshit is the daughter-in-law of the late Congress veteran from U.P. Uma Shankar Dikshit, a tall Brahmin leader who had served as a Union Minister and Governor for a long time.
The Congress feels making Ms. Dikshit, a Brahmin, the face of campaign in Uttar Pradesh will help the party win back support of the community.
The Brahmin community, a traditional vote bank of Congress, had shifted allegiance to BJP in the aftermath of the Mandir-Mandal politics.
A large chunk of Brahmin votes had also gone to Mayawati’s BSP in the past when she gave tickets to many candidates belonging to the community. - PTI
