INLD, BSP tie up for LS, Assembly polls

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 18

The Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) announced a tie-up for next year’s parliamentary and state Assembly elections here on Wednesday.

Abhay Chautala, INLD leader and Leader of Opposition, and Meghraj Singh, incharge of BSP affairs for Haryana, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand, asserted that the primary aim of the alliance was keep the BJP and Congress out of power.

“The INLD and BSP have resolved that the country needs to be rid of both the BJP and the Congress. While the Congress has been guilty of massive corruption, the BJP had led the country towards violent inter-community and inter-communal conflicts with a view to polarising society,” Abhay alleged.

The two parties were determined to champion the cause of Dalits, farmers and labour classes with a view to providing a credible alternative in the state and forming a Third Front at the Centre, they said. The seat-sharing arrangement would be announced at a later stage, they said.

Meghraj announced that Tek Chand Sharma, lone BSP legislator in the state, had been suspended from the party. Sharma had been extending outside support to the BJP government in the state.

The INLD and the BSP had contested the 1998 Lok Sabha elections in alliance and BSP candidate Aman Nagra had won from Ambala.