LUCKNOW: While releasing the third list of 100 party candidates here on Saturday, BSP chief Mayawati exhorted her partymen and campaign managers to target Modi government on one hand over non-performance and demonetisation, on the other the ongoing family feud in Samajwadi Party and poor law and order under Akhilesh government.
The third list of Bahujan Samaj Party released on Saturday has a dominance of Muslims and dalits, who comprise 49 out of 100 names. In all, over 80 Muslim candidates have already got the party tickets
with the last list expected on Sunday.
As per the caste-wise break up of candidates revealed by party chief Mayawati last Tuesday, BSP has decided to field 97 Muslims and 87 Dalits of 403 allocating the rest 113 to upper castes (66 brahmins
and 36 kshatriyas) and 106 to OBCs.
The first list announced on Thursday had 37 Muslim candidates followed by 21 in the second and 27 in the current list.
Muslims constitute almost 19% of the total population of UP and enjoy a decisive vote in almost 125 of 403 seats across the state.
Similarly, the party is contemplating to filed 87 Dalit candidates. While 16 dalits were given tickets in the first list for western UP, 27 made it to the second list for Rohilkhand and Central UP regions. However, the party has decide to filed as many as 22 Dalits on the remaining Central UP including Unnao, Barabanki, Rae Bareli, Fatehpur, Pratapgarh and Allahabad besides Bundelkhand seats including Jalaun, Jhansi, Hamirpur, Lalitpur, Mahoba, Banda and Chitrakoot, etc.
The most prominent name in the third list released on Saturday was that of party’s state unit chief Ram Achal Rajbhar who will contest election from Akbarpur seat in Ambedkarnagar district.
Meanwhile, ahead of sharing the third list of 100 party candidates, the BSP chief convened a high-level meeting of senior party leaders and all the 403 party candidates in the state capital on Saturday.
Taking a lead over other parties, BSP had decided tickets to all the 403 party candidates much in advance. The names of the final candidates were already spelt out to district level party units and
those, who got the ticket, had started working in their respective constituencies.
Addressing the state unit party workers, the BSP chief took the update of party's poll preparedness and also directed the party cadre to follow the code of conduct enforced by the Election Commission.
Discussing the details of the model code of conduct, the BSP chief asked the partymen to follow it in letter and spirit without exception in order to keep the party’s image as a disciplined party intact.
Spelling out party's campaign strategy to those present in the meeting, Mayawati exhorted the party workers to continue organising small district level meetings to strike a direct connect with the voters.
She also shared broader points on which with party's chief campaigners were expected to focus pushing them to target Modi government over non-fulfillment of promises during last two and half years. She also asked them to raise the issue of proposed Parliament session from January 31 and union budget presentation on February 1, 2017 with the motive to woo the voters in poll bound states with populist schemes. The BSP cadre was also asked to focus on the ongoing family feud in SP apart from the alleged failure of Akhilesh government on all the fronts including law and order. Mayawati asked her partymen to convince the voter that it was high time to get rid of this inert dispensation.