Exodus from BSP brightens Congress prospects

Unlike the Assembly election held in November last year, the Congress is not even thinking of aligning with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), much less sending feelers to Mayawati.

Instead, Chief Minister Kamal Nath has virtually demolished the BSP leadership by bringing over a dozen of its top leaders into the Congress fold ahead of the Lok Sabha election.

Among the ten BSP leaders who joined the Congress on March 10, are two former state presidents and a former MP.

They are Pradeep Ahirwar and Satyaprakash Jatav.

Another set of BSP leaders including a former MLA joined the Congress on Wednesday.

The defection coincided with BSP supremo Mayawati’s announcement that her party will have no truck with the Congress in any state.

Kamal Nath who is also the state Congress president was present during the occasion at Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) office where the leaders joined the grand old party.

The BSP brushed aside the development saying that these leaders were already expelled due to their anti-party activities.

But party insiders admit that the exodus of these leaders from the BSP has severely hit the party's prospects in the Lok Sabha election.

In the Assembly election, the BSP managed to win just one seat while its vote share shrunk to well below 5%.

Having engineered defection in the BSP, a resurgent Congress is looking to win two seats each in Vindhya and Chambal regions where the Mayawati’s Scheduled Caste vote bank is concentrated.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, BSP candidates polled more votes in Gwalior and Morena (Chambal region) and Satna ( Vindhya) than was the margin of defeat of the Congress candidates in these constituencies.

In the Assembly election last year, however, the BSP’s vote share drastically came down.

Mayawati has refused to join hands with the Congress for a pre-poll alliance with it ahead of the state Assembly elections held in November last year.

Later, the BSP entered into a pre-poll alliance with the Samajvadi Party. Ahead of the Lok Sabha election, too, the SP and the BSP have entered into a pre-poll alliance in Madhya Pradesh.

The SP will contest in three seats while the BSP will field its candidates on the remaining 26 seats.

In 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BSP had drawn blank from Madhya Pradesh. Earlier, in 2009 Lok Sabha polls, the BSP had one MP from Madhya Pradesh.