BSP chief Mayawati on Sunday implored the Election Commission to ensure the coming Uttar Pradesh polls were free and fair.
Speaking at a press conference in Lucknow, Mayawati was quoted by ANI as saying, “Fear of the Election Commission is necessary in the government machinery. EC must ensure free and fair elections...BJP will lose this election if they will not misuse government machinery and not manipulate the voting machines.”
Mayawati declared she would meet leaders of the BSP on Sunday to finalise candidates for the Uttar Pradesh polls. “Assembly polls in all the five states must be held peacefully. Police administration must work without bias. The people of Uttar Pradesh should vote for development. Our party will follow all guidelines of EC. I will chair a high-level meeting of party officials today regarding the final selection of candidates,” she said.
On Saturday, after the schedule for the Uttar Pradesh polls was announced, Mayawati tweeted that the Election Commission must pay attention to and act against attempts by the BJP to violate the model code of conduct.
Unlike leaders of the BJP, Congress and Samajwadi Party, Mayawati has kept a low profile in the poll campaign. The Times of India reported, “Party members say that the outfit has been active on ground, holding meetings and organising cadres but when and if Mayawati steps out, it will make a massive difference to cadre morale.”
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However, Mayawati has been reaching out to intellectuals. “In a bid to replicate her party’s thunderous success in the 2007 UP assembly polls, Mayawati asked her close political aide, party MP Satish Chandra Mishra to hold prabuddha sammelans (intellectual meets) directed at consolidating Brahmin votes as part of its social engineering programme,” The Times of India reported.