Lucknow, Jan 15 (IANS) Replying to allegations over a fund collection drive ahead of her birthday, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati Thursday targeted each of her rivals and said she could ask her followers to observe Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's birthday as 'slavery day' or Samajwadi Party head Mulayam Singh Yadav's birthday as 'broker day'.
Though she clarified she had no intention to have a slanging match with opposition parties, Mayawati systematically ran down each of the opposition parties - the Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
'If I also decide to call them names just as they have been doing with me, I could teach the opposition parties a proper lesson in their own language,' Mayawati told the select gathering that converged at her official residence to greet her on her 53rd birthday.
'In that case, if I wanted, I could have got my partymen to observe Congress president Sonia Gandhi's birthday as 'ghulami diwas' (slavery day), considering that she was ruling the country despite being a person of foreign origin - a charge repeatedly levelled against her by several other political parties,' the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief quipped.
'In view of their blatant hobnobbing with big business houses, Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's birthday could be observed as 'dalal diwas' (broker's day).'
For the BJP she said: 'The manner in which it has repeatedly deceived us, birthdays of its leaders could conveniently be termed as 'dhokadhari diwas' (cheating day).
'But instead of indulging in any such cheap act, we decided to stage dignified protests in each of Uttar Pradesh's 403 state assembly constituencies as well as in several other parts of the country where our partymen would hold demonstrations to mark their condemnation of the entire opposition tirade against me.'
These demonstrations have been termed as 'virodhi party dhikkar diwas' (day of condemnation of opposition parties).
BSP leaders have been asked to expose the misdeeds of past Samajwadi Party, BJP and Congress governments on this occasion.
While Mayawati' birthday every year is celebrated as 'arthik sahayog divas' when party workers collect funds for BSP, the opposition this year alleged that many leaders were indulging in extortions and blamed an engineer's murder last month, allegedly by a BSP legislator, on the fund-raising drive.
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