BSP: PIL against EC decision a conspiracy

 Terming the PIL at the Allahabad High Court challenging the EC decision to drape the statues of Mayawati and party symbol --the elephants—a conspiracy by its political rivals, the BSP on Tuesday said it would expose those behind the plot.

“The opposition parties have got an agent of theirs to file a weak PIL against the EC order so that the same may be rejected by the court and the EC order gets judicial,” BSP national general secretary S C Mishra here said.

Mishra said that the party would engage a lawyer to expose this conspiracy in the court.
He said that though the order was “unconstitutional” and “one sided” yet the BSP did not want to challenge it in the courts. “We instead will like to take it to the court of the people'', he said.

The petitioner, a local lawyer, has contended that elephants were also symbol of Lord Ganesha according to Hindu mythology and as such the order is likely to hurt religious sentiment. The PIL would come up for hearing on Wednesday next.

The EC had on Saturday ordered covering of all statues of Mayawati and the elephants to give a “level playing field to all the stake holders' in the forthcoming assembly polls.
While the opposition parties welcomed the order, the BSP slammed it and termed it `anti-dalit'.

Minsters left BSP

In yet another setback to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati, former Uttar Pradesh ministers Rakesh Dhar Tripathi and Fateh Bahadur Singh on Tuesday resigned from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).

The duo said they will contest the forthcoming polls as independents.