Chief ministerial ambition made Maya dump Akhilesh

Chief ministerial ambition may have prompted BSP supremo Mayawati to dump her Uttar Pradesh 'mahagathbandhan' partner and Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav.

Mayawati had on Sunday ended her party's alliance with the SP and announced to go solo in all forthcoming elections-big or small.

According to the SP sources, the grand alliance, had it continued, could have turned out to be an ''obstacle'' in Mayawati's dream of occupying the CM's post in the event of the 'mahagathbandhan's' win in the next assembly polls in UP, which were due in 2022.

''It was unofficially decided when the SP and BSP came together in January this year that Akhilesh would support Mayawati's candidature for the prime minister's post if BJP failed to form the government at the centre,'' said a senior SP leader here.

''In turn, Mayawati would have supported Akhilesh for the UP CM's post,'' the leader added.

The results of the Lok Sabha polls, however, upset their calculations. ''Mayawati would have been forced to support Akhilesh for the CM's post if their alliance continued in the 2022 assembly polls in UP,'' the leader remarked.

''By ending the alliance, Mayawati has freed herself from that obligation,'' he said.

SP leaders said that BSP had ''gained'' from the alliance as it now had ten MPs in the Lok Sabha. BSP had drawn a blank in the 2014 LS polls.

''Mayawati will now try to project herself as the messiah of the Muslim community in the state to make a dent in the SP's vote bank',, the leader added.

The BSP supremo had said that Akhilesh did not want her party to field a large number of Muslim candidates in the LS polls. Mayawati has also made a Muslim (Danish Ali) the leader of the BSP group in Lok Sabha.