Congress-BSP alliance in Haryana on the cards?

Speculations are rife over the possibility of a pre-poll alliance between the Congress and Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in Haryana next month.

Sources said that former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and newly coronated Haryana congress chief Kumari Selja met Mayawati in the national capital late on Sunday. The meeting lasted for less than an hour. Sources indicate that the leaders of the two parties discussed an alliance to take on the BJP in upcoming elections.

The Congress in Haryana is in dire straits after its humiliating defeat in the general elections, where it lost all the 10 Lok Sabha seats. Top Congress leaders including Hooda, his son Deepinder, a four-time MP, lost the polls.

Though the BSP is not considered a force to reckon with in Jat-dominated Haryana, the Congress hopes to capitalize on the Dalit votes with Mayawati by its side.

If at all the Congress and the BSP agree on an alliance, seat-sharing is going to be a major hurdle. In previous alliances in Haryana, the BSP has insisted on a sizable number of seats to field its candidates.

The BSP in Haryana has a poor track record of staying alliances and is infamous for exiting poll-alliances at will.

Mayawati first allied with Chautala’s Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), which she exited abruptly. The BSP then formed an alliance with a newly-formed fringe political outfit led by rebel BJP MP from Kurukshetra, which it exited in no time. It then formed an alliance with the Janata Jananayak Party (JJP), the outfit carved out of the INLD, owing to a family feud between Chautala’s two sons, Ajay and Abhay.

The likelihood of an alliance between the BSP and Congress could also be a tactical move to negate much of the dissent that may be brewing among SC community, post the removal of Ashok Tanwar from the Congress party.