‘Would rather die than benefit BJP’: Priyanka Gandhi messages SP-BSP-RLD alliance

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, the Congress general secretary on Thursday signaled to the Mayawati-Akhilesh Yadav alliance in Uttar Pradesh that her party’s candidates would not hurt the chances of the opposition candidates. Priyanka Gandhi had yesterday explained her party’s strategy in selecting candidates for the Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh, the state that sends the largest number of candidates to Parliament.

That her initial explanation had probably been misunderstood became clear on Thursday when Akhilesh Yadav said he didn’t believe that the Congress had fielded weak candidates on any seat. “No party does it. People are not with them. That is why they are making excuses,” Akhilesh Yadav told ANI.

Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati has also kept up her attacks coming at the Congress, an indication that she did not see herself to be on the same side as the party led by Rahul gandhi.

I’d rather die than benefit BJP,” Priyanka Gandhi said on Thursday, her response to the scathing barbs from Akhilesh Yadav. “We have chosen candidates that are either fighting very strongly or cutting BJP votes,” she said, according to news agency ANI.

It is a strategy that Rahul Gandhi had also alluded to in his media interviews. But it is for the first time that Priyanka Gandhi had explicitly outlined the Congress’s strategy. That there were seats in Uttar Pradesh where the Congress knew it didn’t stand a chance and here, the party had fielded candidates who would cut into the ruling BJP’s support base.

“In UP, we are giving a tough fight wherever our organisation or candidate is strong. At other places where we do not have a strong organization, we are cutting into votes of the BJP and not the SP-BSP-RLD alliance. Yes, we will work and the Congress will form the next government in 2022 in Uttar Pradesh,” Priyanka Gandhi told Hindustan Times on Wednesday.

In all, the Congress has fielded candidates on 69 of UP’s 80 seats.

The Congress had been interested in contesting the national elections as part of the alliance led by Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav. But the deal did not work out due to a serious difference over the number of seats that the Congress should get. The Congress has since then been looking at focusing on reviving the party’s much-eroded base in the state.

In the 2014 elections, the Congress had fielded 67 candidates and ended up with just about 7.5 per cent of the votes polled, a sharp drop from the 18 per cent vote share just five years earlier.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s political plunge was part of this design to revive the Congress in UP. She was tasked with overseeing the organisation in eastern Uttar Pradesh while Jyotiraditya Scindia was mandated to look at western Uttar Pradesh.