'BJP stoking nationalism for poll gains'

Sounding the poll bugle at an impressive public rally in Agra, BSP supremo Mayawati on Sunday termed the BJP as ‘anti-dalit’ and said the saffron party was stoking nationalism for electoral gains.

Mayawati also said that the BJP’s Kashmir policy was a diversionary tactic and an attempt to deflect attention of the people from its government’s failure to deliver. “The BJP may go to war on Kashmir issue,” she said, addressing the huge turnout at Kothi Meena Bazar grounds.
The BSP supremo referred to attacks on Dalits in different parts of the country and accused the BJP of “conspiring to do away with reservation” for the Scheduled Castes and other weaker sections.

Mayawati also took a potshot at the recent BJP sponsored “Dhamma Yatra” in the state and said that the RSS cadre had turned “fake” Dalits and joined the “Yatra” as Buddhists. Referring to the use of derogatory words against her by expelled BJP leader Daya Shankar Singh, she said: “They will be sent to jail once the BSP comes in power.”

The BSP supremo rejected charges that her party sold tickets. “If the BSP, as claimed by the opponents, is certain to lose, then why will any one want its tickets?,” she asked.

Mayawati attacked the Congress for “misleading” Dalits during its regimes and doing nothing for their welfare.

“The Congress has projected an old lady, a Brahmin to get upper caste votes....she is the same person who had said that the people from UP, Bihar were spoiling Delhi,” she said, referring to Sheila Dixit, the Congress face for UP polls. “It is the BSP, which accorded due respect to the upper caste and even demanded reservation for the poor among them,” she added.

Maya, Bhagwat lock horns

RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat and BSP supremo Mayawati are involved in a verbal duel on the issue of Hindu population in the country, DHNS reports from Lucknow.

Bhagwat had said that there was no law in the country that stopped the Hindu community from increasing its population.

The remark by the RSS chief came when some teachers told him that the population of Hindus was not increasing, while the other communities were increasing their numbers.

“Which law prevents the Hindus from increasing their population?” Bhagwat retorted.
On Sunday, Mayawati asked Bhagwat to state from where  Hindus would bring food for their children if they chose to increase their population.