Mayawati pulls out her support to UPA

With an eye on the upcoming general elections which seems more imminent at present coalition stand off, the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati on Saturday evening announced to take back her support from the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) at Centre.

Mayawati in a press conference in New Delhi accused the ruling Congress of tarnishing her party’s image in the state and also the government’s failure to tame the spiralling food and oil price. However, she refused to reveal any further strategy of her party ahead of the general election.

Dismissing a question of moving closer to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) she said that Congress and BJP are two sides of the same coin and as a national party BSP is independent to take any decission without following any other as the central government has failed on many fronts.

The BSP, who has at present 17 MPs in the Lok Sabha, moreover rules in Uttar Pradesh, though no immediate threat to the UPA alliance but can be proved a major asset in the emerging scenario of coalition politics. Mayawati has sent a letter of withdrawal to President Pratibha Patil and Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee.

Answering the question of support to a no-confidence motion to the present coalition she said, “In case a no-confidence motion against the UPA government is brought in parliament, her party will decide on the basis of the issue," Mayawati said.

BSP’s pulling out, however, is a setback for Congress who is facing wrath on different fronts: price rise, spiralling inflation and Indo-US nuclear deal from its major coalition partner the Left Front.

As the general election is round the corner considering every political development, Mayawati certainly wants to gain political mileage setting her own agenda taking the issues of common man including food price, oil price, and the soaring inflation to garner more and more votes.

At this point of time, if the Left withdraws support from the government then Congress may likely to look for support of other parties like Samajwadi Party (SP) which has 39 MPs in a house of 534.

Mayawati though didn’t point a single cause of her support back, but to large charged Congress for serving a step-motherly attitude to Uttar Pradesh government citing a special package of 80 thousand crore rupees and also the issue of Taj corridor case, which is still hanging over her head.