In another jolt to the Bahujan Samaj Party, Mayawati's once trusted lieutenant and former minister R K Chaudhary on Thursday quit the party accusing her of "auctioning" tickets to contest assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
The opposition parties on Sunday slammed the move to hire public servants through lateral entry, claiming it will snatch reservations from SCs, STs and OBCs, but the Bharatiya Janata Party hit back stating the National Democratic Alliance government was bringing transparency to this mode of recruitment started by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance.
Though there was no official word from both the parties, the sources claimed that two Uttar Pradesh-based political outfits will contest 37 Lok Sabha seats each.
Mayawati was, pre-election, hell-bent upon preventing Amar, Mulayam and Subroto Roy from 'running away' from India. But for Cabinet Secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh's temporary intervention with behenji, Amar Singh would have been put behind bars the day she took over as chief minister.
Senior Samajwadi Party leader and Public Works and Irrigation Minister Shivpal Yadav on Sunday virtually declared war against the party's sworn political foe and former Chief Minister Mayawati.
In an all Dalit village in Muzzaffarnagar, three girls who do mazdoori after finishing the day's chores, will cast their vote for the first time. Opening their home and heart to Archana Masih/Rediff.com, they say all they want is a high school, a vehicle to take them to the main road and a sewing machine.
The BJP had registered a one-sided victory on all the 17 SC-reserved seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. But in 2019, out of these 17 seats, it lost Nagina and Lalganj seats to the Bahujan Samaj Party.
BSP leader Kanshi Ram's mother, Bishan Kaur, moved the apex court seeking his release from the 'illegal confinement' of party president Mayawati.
The National Level Monitors have pointed out grave irregularities in the NREGA scheme in Uttar Pradesh.
Addressing a press conference in Delhi, Mayawati said the Income Tax department has been informed about 'each and every property' she owns.
Efforts to give a final shape to a national alternative to the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party continued on Sunday with Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary Prakash Karat meeting Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati in Delhi. Karat drove to the Uttar Pradesh chief minister's residence in Delhi and held discussions with her for around three hours.
She alleged that her partymen's counter-remarks were deliberately misconstrued by the saffron party, reflecting its "polluted" and "casteist" mentality.
SP state President Akhilesh Yadav also claimed that all sections of the society, including farmers and workers, were disappointed with the state government.
Noting that the Bahujan Samaj Party had held a dialogue with the Bharatiya Janata Party in the past, Nationalist Congress Party supremo Sharad Pawar on Wednesday said no decision on the Mayawati-led party's inclusion in Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc can be taken until there is clarity on whose side she is on.
Mayawati demanded that the assets of the prime minister's foster daughter and her husband be scrutinised.
"I wish to reassure all Muslims that no one will be allowed to target common Muslims in the name of terrorist hunt," Mayawati told a specially convened press conference at her official residence in Lucknow on Sunday.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Saturday accused Mahatma Gandhi of dividing the country on caste lines and coining "an uncontitutional term" to denote Dalits.
Samajwadi Party Member of Parliament Jaya Bachchan on Tuesday alleged that Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati was pursuing action against her husband Amitabh Bachchan to gain cheap publicity."She (Mayawati) does so many things, she does not do things. Do journalists write about these things? But when she takes action against Amitabh Bachchan, you people write," Jaya said. Her remarks came a day after the Barabanki district authorities issued a notice to the superstar.
An Uttar Pradesh government spokesperson said a formal order for all eateries along the Kanwar Yatra route in the state was likely to be issued soon.
Barely 24 hours after the Allahabad high court expressed serious concern about her government's inaction to resolve the two-week old agitation by the Jat community seeking inclusion among backward castes, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati has chosen to blame the Centre for the spiraling protests.Mayawati sought to take credit for removing the agitators from the railway tracks in parts of western UP, where services had been completely disrupted.
A local court in Lucknow on Monday issued a non-bailable warrant against suspended Bharatiya Janata Party leader Dayashankar Singh.
The Congress on Thursday attacked Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati for dubbing Rahul Gandhi's dharna in Greater Noida as "mean theatrics", saying she was acting out of "frustration".
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on late on Wednesday night launched a counter offensive against opposition parties accusing them of provoking the farmers of Bhatta Parsaul into violence and charged the Centre with doing nothing to bring a new law for land acquisition.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Saturday said that those seen at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's roadshow in Varanasi were "mere spectators" brought in from other states and districts in Uttar Pradesh where voting had already taken place.
"The terror attacks are yet another proof of the failure of central intelligence agencies. We were not given any sort of prior warning about the imminent terror attack. No information was shared with the state police," Mayawati told a press conference in Lucknow.
Tetra Devi, the mother of Dayashankar filed a complaint against the BSP leaders for raising "derogatory" slogans at the party protest in Lucknow on Thursday.
Vidhan Sabha Principal Secretary and Returning Officer R P Pandey declared Mayawati and Maurya elected unopposed after the expiry of the time for withdrawal of nominations on Thursday.
Faced with one of the worst showing in Lok Sabha elections in which her party failed to open its account, BSP chief Mayawati on Saturday said the parties which had supported the UPA at the Centre faced the anger of the people towards the Congress-led alliance.
'The 2024 general elections proved that UP is not Gujarat.'
Sunday's landmark decision would set free all male prisoners above the age of 66 years and female prisoners above 62 years, who had completed half their jail terms on the cut off date, June 3, 2007.
Mayawati, who has raised the pitch for the dismissal of the 41-month-old government, described the move as a mark of protest against the speaker's continued recognition of the BSP's 37 defectors as members of the ruling Samajwadi Party.
The closure of Reliance Fresh outlets in Lucknow is a boost for the Samajwadi Party.
Mayawati ordered a large scale reshuffling of IAS and IPS officers.
The BSP chief is already a Lok Sabha member from Akbarpur seat in Uttar Pradesh.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati on Thursday said Narendra Modi could change the secular credentials of the Constitution on the pretext of reviewing it and give it "Hindutva colour", if he came to power.
Terming Narendra Modi's rally being denied in the temple town and the ensuing protests from the saffron party leaders in Varanasi as a "new drama", Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati has alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party in connivance with the Samajwadi Party was "doing" this to influence the elections on the remaining seats in the state.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) gave a huge blow to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance by winning 43 seats out of total 80 Lok Sabha seats of Uttar Pradesh, as per the Election Commission.
Even as Samajwadi Party Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and his son Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav both preferred not to react to their bete noire Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati's threat to thrash SP goons, Mulayam's brother and multiple portfolio minister Shivpal Yadav has decided to do a tit for tat.
Tourists visiting Lucknow will have something new to look forward to in the coming months. The state government is developing the sites bearing statues of its chief minister Mayawati as tourist hot spots.
Faced with protests by farmers demanding higher compensation for land acquired for a township along the Taj Expressway, the Mayawati government on Tuesday decided to hike the price offered to them by 20 per cent at Rs 570 per square metre. A team of top state officials led by state cabinet secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh and some senior ministers of the Mayawati government held parleys with farmer leader Ram Babu Kateria at the Aligarh airstrip in the early hours of Tuesday.
