LUCKNOW: The high-pitched campaign trail for the seventh and final phase of UP Assembly elections might have ended on Monday evening, but the exchange of acerbic taunts is far from over as the stakeholders are not letting go even a single opportunity to trounce the opponent in a war of words.
In a similar attempt, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav made some flutter in the otherwise silent political landscape of UP which is awaiting polling for its final phase on March 8.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, the CM asked the PM to give details of the Centre’s development work done in UP during the last three years. He also, once again, accused BSP chief Mayawati of propagating corruption. He claimed that the BSP chief had been accepting money in lieu of tickets from aspiring party candidates in Assembly elections.
“Bina nagadi ke buaji ke yahan se koi prasad nahi milta (Without cash, you can’t get anything from aunt’s place),” he quipped, charging the BSP chief with flying off to Delhi as soon as the poll campaign was over. He clarified that he himself had no designs for Delhi. “I have no dream for Delhi. I am here and shall remain here only to work for my people,” he averred.
Trading an often-repeated charge on his prime target PM Narendra Modi that he had forgotten all his 2104 poll promises, Akhilesh denounced the latter’s efforts to mobilise the voters of his parliamentary constituency Varanasi by camping there for three days. He reminded the PM of his ‘forgotten promise’ of turning Varanasi into ‘Kyoto’.
In a wisecrack, the CM, exuding confidence that he would be there in the UP saddle again after March 11, extended all help to the PM in executing his roadmap for Varanasi’s development.
“After forming the next government in the state, I assure the PM that my government will extend all help to him in turning Varanasi into Kyoto. Aap roadmap toh laiye, hum poora sahyog karenge (You give me roadmap and I will extend all help).”
Though Kyoto and Varanasi were historic cities, PM Modi failed to transform even a bit of Varanasi on the lines of Kyoto, he said. He also discounted BJP’s promise of appointing Class III and Class IV employees without any interview.
However, the CM himself claimed that Samajwadi Party government had already done away with process of interview for recruitment. “We appointed 32,000 policemen only on the basis of high school and intermediate marks and physical fitness,” he said.
He rejected the Opposition’s criticism of his government as regards to basic infrastructural development of Purvanchal saying that the road network in the state had improved a lot under his rule.
During his entire campaigning for UP elections, the CM had been harping on the transformation of roads across the state in a big way. His entire projection had been based on 302-km Agra-Lucknow Expressway and the promise to extend it to other districts in the next five years.
The polling for the final 40 seats across seven Purvanchal districts will be held under seventh phase of Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections on March 8. The results of the Assembly elections will be declared on March 11.