Nagpur: The Nationalist Congress party supremo Sharad Pawar on Tuesday announced that 13 members of the legislative assembly in Uttar Pradesh will be joining the Samajwadi Party.
The statement comes after Uttar Pradesh labour minister Swami Prasad Maurya resigned from the Yogi Adityanath-led state government and joined the Samajwadi Party ahead of the state assembly polls. In a letter, Maurya said that he is resigning from the party due to Yogi-led government’s ‘negligence’ towards Dalits, farmers, small and medium scale businesses and unemployed youths in the state.
After him, three other BJP MLAs in the state followed and quit the party. Tilhar MLA Roshan Lal Verma, Bilhaur MLA Bhagwati Prasad Sagar and Tindwari MLA Brajesh Prajapati, resigned from the Saffron party on Tuesday. Pawar announced that in Uttar Pradesh they (NCP) will be contesting elections along with Samajwadi Party and other smaller parties.
He further added that the people of Uttar Pradesh are looking for a ‘change.’ “We will surely see that change in the state. Communal polarization is being done in Uttar Pradesh ahead of Assembly elections. The people of the state will give a befitting reply to this,” he said while addressing the media.
The NCP supremo also mentioned that the party is in talks with the Congress and Mamata Banerjee led Trinamool Congress for a possible alliance in Goa.
The Election Commission on Saturday announced election schedules for five poll bound states – Manipur, Uttarakhand, Goa, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab. The Assembly election in Uttar Pradesh will be held in seven phases from February 7 onwards.
