Upper caste quota a political drama by BJP: OP Rajbhar

AGRA: Uttar Pradesh minister and president of the Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party OP Rajbhar, who has been demanding reservation in three categories of the backward castes in UP, has dubbed BJP’s move to grant quota to poor upper castes as a “political drama”. He said this while interacting with media in Aligarh on Sunday.

Rajbhar, who’s party is an ally of the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP government, said this reservation is unacceptable and BJP-led NDA government should instead implement 27% reservations.

“If our alliance with BJP has to continue, then there should be a division of reservation quota of the backward castes into three categories — backward, very backward and most backward,” said Rajbhar. “It will help BJP as there are nearly 5-8 lakh voters from the backward castes in each Lok Sabha constituency,” he claimed.

On being asked why was he speaking against BJP when he is a minister in the Yogi government, Rajbhar said he “is the national president of Bhartiya Samaj Party and is an alliance partner of BJP”. He further said he speaks the truth and is not afraid of being called a “rebel”.

Reacting on the recently announced pre-poll alliance of SP-BSP in UP for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, Rajbhar said the combine will not be able to dent BJP’s poll prospects in the state. “The SP-BSP alliance in UP is like a used cartridge. It won't impact the prospects of ruling BJP here,” he said while adding that no one can ignore the fact that their coming together has indeed made the task somewhat difficult for BJP.