Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati has convened a meeting of the party’s State leaders in New Delhi on October 16.
BSP’s State general secretary Arakalavadi Nagendra said the party’s zonal leaders have been invited to attend the meeting. “I am also attending the meeting as Mysuru zone leader,” he said.
The meeting comes close on the heels of the resignation of BSP’s lone member of the JD(S)-Congress coalition ministry, N. Mahesh, on Thursday. Mr. Mahesh quit as Minister for Primary and Secondary Education.
The October 16 meeting in New Delhi is expected to discuss strategies for strengthening the BSP in Karnataka ahead of the coming Lok Sabha polls.
After submitting his resignation, Mr. Mahesh, who is the only BSP MLA in Karnataka, elected from Kollegal (reserved) Assembly seat, had claimed that he was unable to build the party and focus on development work in his constituency in view of the crucial portfolio of primary and secondary education that he was handling.
Last week, Mr. Mahesh had triggered speculation in political circles by blaming all three mainstream political parties in the State — the Congress, BJP, and JD(S) — for the social and economic disparities that exist in society. While addressing party workers’ in Chamarajanagar, he called upon the BSP cadres to gear up for Lok Sabha elections. Though the party is not a major force in Karnataka, it had fielded candidates in all the 28 Lok Sabha constituencies of the State.
It may also be mentioned here that a section of the BSP leaders in Kollegal had expressed disappointment after the State Government reserved the post of Kollegal City Municipal Council (CMC) chief for a candidate from BCM-B. For, the BSP, which had managed to win as many as 9 out of the 30 CMC seats, was eying the post of President. However, the party did not have any candidate belonging to the category for which the post of President was reserved.
However, BSP leaders in Chamarajanagar ruled out the possibility of Mr Mahesh tendering his resignation on account of the Government’s failure to reserve the post of the CMC President to suit its claim for the coveted post.
Mahesh’s decision after Mayawati’s directive?
The decision of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader N. Mahesh to quit the JD(S)-Congress coalition ministry on Thursday appears to have come in the wake of a directive to this effect by party supremo Mayawati.
According to BSP sources, Mr. Mahesh spoke to Ms. Mayawati in New Delhi earlier this week. “We don’t know what exactly transpired during the meeting, but we presume that ‘behenji’ (Mayawati) could have asked him to resign from the coalition ministry,” the BSP leader said.
The continuation of Mr Mahesh in the coalition comprising Congress had become untenable after Mayawati had lashed out at the Congress after talks over sharing of seats with BSP in poll-bound Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh failed.
Mr Mahesh, however, had cited “personal reasons” while tendering his resignation.
