Despite not campaigning, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav is spearheading his party's campaign in the crucial assembly bypolls. After two strong Congress leaders Saleem Shervani and Annua Tandon joined his party, Akhilesh told Subhash Mishra that the bypolls would reflect the people's mood for 2022 assembly polls...
Why didn't you go to campaign outside UP or even in the bypolls within the state?
• We have extended support to the parties where we had to. In UP, I am fully involved in byelections and would win the maximum number of seats .
Leaders of Congress and BSP are joining you. Are you breaking rival political parties in the run up to the 2022 assembly elections?
• Itis a falsecharge thatI a m luring rival leaders or breaking any party. But if somebody likes SP's ideology, I am ready to welcome them.
Will the results of tomorrow's bypolls spell the mood for 2022 assembly polls?
• It is true that the bypolls neither make nor mar the fate of any government. But, it's true that it would reflect the mood of the people and it is significant to gauge as I have been reiterating that the BJP government has failed on all fronts.
BSP has inched towards the BSP and then denied it.
• Where has anyone denied it? Everybody is targeting SP so rest are in one camp? Where is the confusion?
Do you feel that BJP leadership is strategizing to win the 2022 Assembly elections by reviving the Ram temple issue.
• Anyone
visiting a hospital to admit a Covid-19 patient would lament why there is a BJP government in the state. He would never vote for the BJP. The way Covid-19 patients are being handled at hospitals is beyond imagination.
But the BJP leadership is confident of sweeping the 2022 Assembly election on Ram temple issue.
• Let them live in a dream world. People of the state have made up their mind. They would ensure defeat of the BJP at the hustings. Lakhs of people have turned jobless and labourers and workers have no work. Many starvation deaths have been reported. I did not want to recall the sufferings that migrant workers faced during the initial days of the Corona crisis. Where were BJP leaders then?
Do you feel that injustice is being perpetrated on OBCs in the BJP regime?
• The BJP government has denied jobs to 1,700 police personnel who were selected after a police recruitment exam. After their selection, the state government redesigned the reservation policy only to deny jobs to 1,700 OBCs. Also, If you see the recent UPSC results you will find how OBCs, Dalits and the Muslims have been denied fair treatment.
So to counter the BJP you will play the OBC card
• Now, the time has come one should look beyond the communal agenda. The chief minister has inaugurated a hospital in Noida recently. Just ask him who has built it. Now when hardly one-and-a-halfyear is left for the next election, can the BJP government show me a single development project launched by it. I do not believe in self praise because from Lucknow to Noida 'mera kaam bolta hai'.