Bypolls: SP joins hands with two local parties

Tribune News Service

Lucknow, February 18

The Samajwadi Party (SP) today formed an alliance with two regional parties — the Nirbal Indian Shoshit Hamara Aam Dal (NISHAD) and Peace Party.

SP chief declared that the party would support the Nishad Party candidate, Praveen Kumar Nishad, in the Gorakhpur Lok Sabha bypoll. Praveen Kumar Nishad would contest on the SP symbol — the bicycle, the party said. The SP would soon declare its candidate for the Phulpur LS seat.

“We will hold discussions on Budgets of the BJP governments (Centre and state) and their election manifestoes to bring out the truth. They had earlier confused the people with ‘chai pe charcha’, and now they are planning to confuse with ‘pakoda’,” Yadav said. He said the Gorakhpur campaign would focus on the death of infants at the BRD Hospital due to lack of oxygen. Now, a fire at the administrative block has been reported, destroying key records and evidence.

Accusing the BJP of claiming false achievements, the SP chief said after promising to double farmers’ income, the BJP has now changed the method of calculating farming inputs to claim that it has already increased farmers’ income one-and-a-half times.

The Peace Party is predominantly an outfit of backward Muslims known as ‘Pasmanda Muslims’. The NISHAD represents those sub-castes of the backward community who had been in the profession of rowing boats, catching fishes or on small trades dependent on rivers and ponds. The prominent backward castes which come under the umbrella of the Nishad identity are Kewat, Mallah, Majhi, Rajbhar, Gond, Kashyap and Kahar. Together, this community reportedly constitutes around 17 per cent of the population in east UP.