BSP to fight Chhattisgarh polls with Janta Congress Chhattisgarh, Ajit Jogi to be CM face

LUCKNOW: The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) will be fighting the upcoming Chhattisgarh assembly elections in alliance with Ajit Jogi led Janta Congress Chhattisgarh. Jogi will be the CM face for the alliance in the state.

BSP supremo Mayawati on Thursday said the BSP will fight on 35 seats and the Janta Congress Chhattisgarh will contest on 55 seats. Assembly elections in Chhattisgarh are due later this year.

Ajit Jogi said that together with the BSP, they will be able to defeat the BJP in the state.

BJP has been in power in Chhattisgarh for past 15 years. Satta ka durupyog, paise ka durupyog, prashasnik tantra ka durupoyog karke woh phir se satta mein aana chahti hai. Ab humara gathbandhan ho gaya hai, Mayawati ji aur humlog mil kar unko(BJP) avashya rok lenge: Ajit Jogi pic.twitter.com/gGPIShNbCi — ANI (@ANI) September 20, 2018

The BSP had earlier been in talks with the Congress for the polls. However, the alliance could not be worked out over the reluctance of the Congress to give seats to the BSP. 

The Congress had earlier said that it wants to ally with the BSP, considering the 12 per cent Dalit vote in Chhattisgarh and to counterattack the damage that Jogi's party may cause it in the polls.

Chhattisgarh in-charge of the Congress PL Punia, who was an aide of Mayawati when she was Uttar Pradesh CM, had been supportive of a Congress-BSP alliance in Chhattisgarh. He had said that allying with Mayawati's party will improve the poll prospects of the Congress.

The BSP had contested in all 90 assembly constituencies in the previous state polls in 2013. But it managed to win only one seat and cornered 4.3 per cent of the total votes.