RLD's inclusion in 'Grand Alliance' in UP: Samajwadi Party, Congress differ

Lucknow/New Delhi: The ruling Samajwadi Party (SP) in Uttar Pradesh on Thursday ruled out any alliance with the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) in the upcoming state Assembly Elections and said a pre-poll alliance was being finalised with the Congress party.

However, Congress expressed a different view on the inclusion of RLD in a 'grand alliance' in Uttar Pradesh.

The seven-phase UP Elections will start on February 11.

"We will forge an alliance only with the Congress. We will not ally with the RLD. No talks are going on with them (RLD). We will contest from over 300 seats (out of 403) and the Congress will be there for the rest of them," SP national vice president Kironmoy Nanda told news agency PTI.

The decisions regarding the alliance and seats were taken at a marathon six-hour meeting held by Chief Minister and SP chief Akhilesh Yadav with senior party leaders.

Sources said the RLD wanted more seats than what the SP was ready to part with.

"We wanted the seats of our choice but there was no agreement on it," RLD spokesman Anil Dubey said, declining to elaborate.

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Congress reportedly offered some 20 seats to RLD chief Ajit Singh's son Jayant Choudhary, who is in touch with Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi.

According to insiders, Ajit Singh has said he will not accept less than 30 seats and was now contemplating going solo.

"If the Congress wants to work out a deal with the RLD from its share (of seats), that is up to them," Nanda said.

Hours later, Congress chief spokesman Randeep Surjewala told reporters in Delhi: "Contours of the alliance are being worked out. So...It is premature for me to say something on the issue till things are finalised."

Surjewala said this when asked whether the RLD has been kept out of the tie-up.

In the 2012 Uttar Pradesh Assembly Election, the RLD had won only nine seats. 

Two years later, in the Lok Sabha election, large swaths of Jats, who account for 17 percent of western UP's voters, spurned the party for the BJP.

The Jats are, however, upset as the BJP has not included them in caste-based groups entitled to government jobs and admission in educational institutions.

Nanda said the details of the seats would be announced by SP national president Akhilesh Yadav.

"After the alliance with the Congress, we will get an absolute majority in the state and Akhilesh will become chief minister again," he asserted, adding that the SP will release its poll manifesto soon.

Efforts to cobble together a grand alliance in Bihar too had come across a hurdle with the SP declaring to contest the 2015 Assembly polls in that state on its own.

The Bihar unit of the SP had demanded at least 27 seats but later agreed to contest from 12 seats.

When finally they were given only five seats, the party took it as a humiliation and decided to go it alone.

(With PTI inputs)