Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Tuesday hit out at the opposition parties for targeting her government and the party and said such attacks would only work in her advantage in the assembly elections due next year.
“The functioning of our party and the government is based on the movement of Baba Sahib (B R Ambedkar)...The opposition is not happy and is trying to push back the movement, especially when the assembly elections are near,” she said addressing a rally on the death anniversary of Ambedkar.
The BSP supremo said the comments being made by opposition parties on ministers of her government, MLAs and party functionaries only prove that there was “nothing concrete” against her party or her government.
“Whenever the BSP or its government has been attacked, we have shown better results...Such attacks only help wake up those cadres who are sleeping. It is only to our advantage,” she said.
Ms. Mayawati also asked party workers not to get “distracted” by the various “hurdles” being created by the opposition parties to thwart BSP from its objective of forming a government at the Centre.
Warning her supporters against the designs of the opposition parties, Ms. Mayawati asked them not to get perturbed by the casteist parties but give a befitting reply by ensuring the victory of maximum candidates of the BSP in the polls.
“Before the 2007 assembly polls, all the parties including Samajwadi Party, BJP and Congress used all gimmicks to attack us and declared that BSP is finished but we came back with an absolute majority,” she said.
She also attacked ‘casteist” political parties for not doing enough for the respect and honour of dalits and, instead, harming the “movement of self-respect.”
She said while Ambedkar got the dalits their rights, they were not benefitting from them fully all over the country.
On the occasion, Ms. Mayawati dedicated 160 projects worth Rs. 1,500 crore to the people of the state.
