The Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) isn’t jumping to any conclusions yet on Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s hint that the Samajwadi Party may join hands with the BSP to keep the Bharatiya Janata Party out of power.
Akhilesh’s comment came just before some exit polls predicted a hung Assembly with no party likely to touch the magic figure of 202 to form a government of its own.
The BSP, however, has said that it was not thinking of an alliance with anyone to form the government.
“Will wait and watch for results, as of now not thinking of alliance with anyone,” ANI quoted BSP sources as saying.
Just ahead of the exit poll results, Akhilesh Yadav told BBC in an interview that he was open to joining hands with anyone to prevent the BJP from forming its government in the state.
"I address the leader of the BSP with a respectable name (bua) and would not like to say anything beyond this as of now," he said when asked about aligning with BSP chief Mayawati.
Instantly, Mayawati told a private news channel that her party was confident of crossing the half-mark on its and thus forming a majority government.
Meanwhile, senior Samajwadi Party leader Ramgopal Yadav today said that the data of exit polls were manipulated by TV channels at the behest of some political parties and that his party will emerge victories on March 11.
“I have information that the original exit polls were changed under pressure by channels few days back. We are 100 per cent winning the elections,” he said.
Most of the exit polls have predicted a hung assembly with the BJP emerging as the single largest party.
According to NewsX-MRC poll, the BJP and its allies may win 185 seats, the Congress-Samajwadi Party combine 120 and BSP 90.
The India TV-CVoter exit poll predicted 155-167 seats for the BJP, 135-147 for the SP-Congress alliance and 81-93 for the BSP.
TimesNow-VMR predicted the BJP could win 190-210 seats, the Samajwadi-Congress 110-130 and the BSP 57-74. CNN-News18-Gramener said that the BJP could win 164 seats, the Samajwadi-Congress 147 and the BSP 81.
The IndiaToday-Axis poll, however, gave the BJP a comfortable majority of 251-279 seats. The Samajwadi-Congress could win 88-112 seats and the BSP 28-42 seats, the exit poll said.
