Learn from defeats: Union Minister Anupriya Patel’s stinker to ally BJP

The leader of Apna Dal (Sonelal), a constituent of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), Anupriya Patel has reiterated her party’s stance that the saffron outfit was ignoring the smaller ally.

The national president of Apna Dal(S) Ashish Patel had said on Tuesday that small parties should be respected and given due importance by their bigger allies.

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“We want an NDA government at the centre in 2019 once more under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But the BJP will have to take better care of its allies in Uttar Pradesh. It should learn from its defeats in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh lest it goes the same way in Uttar Pradesh,” he had said.

He had also cautioned the BJP that a tie-up between the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP) in Uttar Pradesh would pose a challenge to it in the Lok Sabha election next year.

Read more: Day after Apna Dal asks NDA to respect allies, Anupriya skips Yogi Adityanath’s event

“My party president has already expressed the party’s view and I stand by it,” Anupriya, who is the Union minister of state for health, said on Thursday.

Anupriya had skipped a programme of chief minister Yogi Adityanath in Deoria on Wednesday, a day after Ashish made the comments against the BJP.

Before that, Ashish said his party was not happy with the behaviour of the BJP-led state government with Anupriya, also his wife. The Apna Dal(S) chief claimed that she was not given adequate importance and not even invited for inaugurations of medical colleges.

The Apna Dal expressed its dissatisfaction days after Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RSLP) chief Upendra Kushwaha walked out of the NDA. He was upset with the BJP after it asserted that the RLSP would not be given more than two seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

In 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Apna Dal(S) had contested two seats, Mirzapur and Pratapgarh, and won both. While Anupriya won from Mirzapur, Harivansh Singh bagged Pratapgarh. Apna Dal(S) also has nine MLAs in the state assembly.

Read more: Amid ally trouble, BJP says it is getting new ones ahead of 2019 polls

Ashish had also said Anupriya had been invited for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rally scheduled in Ghazipur on December 29 but she would not attend it. He said unless the central leadership of the BJP finds a solution to the problem, his party would not cooperate with it in any way.

“BJP president Amit Shah should intervene in the matter and resolve it,” he said.

He alleged that BJP legislators and leaders from Varanasi had been boycotting Apna Dal programmes in Mirzapur for the last six months.

However, BJP legislator from Mirzapur Ratnakar Mishra refuted the allegations and said the BJP had not boycotted any event of Anupriya Patel. “Apna Dal (S) is our ally and we attend the events organised by the party,” he claimed.