UP polls: SP prepared to go solo if needed?

Lucknow: A day after two senior Cong leaders sprang a surprise when they visited Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati’s residence in Lucknow but were denied audience by her, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Wednesday said the party has prepared its cadre to take complete control of booths in all 403 assembly constituencies of the state.Though Akhilesh said this was done to ensure that SP cadre extend full organisational support to the alliance partner on any of the 403 seats as and when needed, in the political circles the move is being seen as a subtle hint from Akhilesh that his party was poll-ready on all 403 seats and could go solo in assembly polls if things did not work out as desired.“In order to form a PDA government in 2027 we have thoroughly prepared our cadre across all 403 assembly constituencies because we want that whichever party enters into an alliance with us and contest elections, our workers at the booth level extend the support of our strong organisational structure,” Akhilesh said addressing functionaries at party headquarters on Wednesday evening . “This has been done because we have always maintained that wining a seat is more important than number of seats that SP shares with its alliance partner,” Akhilesh said.The SP chief’s carefully worded statement gains significance in the light of Cong MP Tanuj Punia and party’s Schedule Caste cell’s national president Rajendra Pal Gautam’s visit to Mayawati’s residence in Lucknow on Tuesday. The BSP supremo, however, reportedly declined to meet the two. On Wed, the Cong issued showcase notice to the two leaders over visiting the BSP supremo without being authorised by the party to do so.Interestingly on Tuesday itself, speaking at an event organised by a Hindi daily, Akhilesh Yadav had expressed confidence in INDIA bloc taking on the BJP in UP polls and had even stated that seat-sharing with alliance partners had never been an issue for the SP and it was always about wining a seat rather than number of seats while finalising alliances.On the face of it the show-cause by Cong to the two functionaries does indicate that the they went to visit Mayawati on their own accord and were not mandated to do so by the party leadership, political experts think otherwise. That the development took place at a time when Cong MP Rahul Gandhi was in Rae Bareli which was barely 90 km from Lucknow has left many wondering if it was as real a coincidence as it was being made out to be.“How can two Dalit functionaries including one based in Delhi suddenly decide to do the unthinkable - visit Mayawati without any prior appointment with her or a nod from their own party?” wondered aloud a political analyst. “I don’t think the notice would have been issued to the two had they succeeded in meeting Mayawati,” he said. He was of the view that if the two Dalit functionaries had succeeded in meeting Mayawati, the Congress would have used it to bargain a better deal in terms of seat-sharing with the SP in UP polls.Sources said that SP strategists have taken a serious note of the development but opted not to get vocal about it after the party president decided to take the things ‘in his stride’ particularly after the two Cong functionaries were served show-cause notice.