Shivpal’s party to initiate alliance talk with Cong

Agra: With SP-BSP alliance in place, Samajwadi Party’s former strong man Shivpal Yadav, who recently launched his own Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia (PSPL), is all set to initiate talks about a possible tie-up with Congress.
Shivpal Yadav said he had appointed Mohammad Adeeb, former Rajya Sabha member, to initiate talks for an alliance with Congress and other secular parties.Incidentally, Adeeb and more than 12 other Muslim leaders joined Shivpal’s party on Tuesday.
Talking with TOI, Adeeb said he will be meeting Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday and urge him to fight the upcoming Lok Sabha polls as a major party in their proposed alliance. “We are a small party but we have ground level workers across the state.”
Adeeb said at present, the situation of minorities in the state is at its worse despite the fact that they constitute 18% of the population. He said he and other leaders from the community had joined Shivpal in order to consolidate Muslim vote.
“Muslims are being isolated, we have been neglected as if we are untouchables. Several lynching cases have been reported from various parts of the country but no political party is supporting us,” said Adeeb, adding that Shivpal had promised to support them.
He said Muslim should consolidate their vote to ensure BJP’s defeat BJP. He said all small parties should join hands and he is already in talks with other parties, including OP Rajbhar’s Suheldev Bahujan Samaj Party.
Adeeb attacked both Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati for the SP-BSP alliance. He called Mayawati untrustworthy and claimed that she would join hands with BJP once she secured 30-plus seats in the state.
He said he would invite all old boys of AMU and intellectual Muslims in the first week of February to chalk out a strategy for the consolidation of the community’s vote.
Party’s chief spokesperson CP Rai said BSP is BJP’s puppet and everyone knows it history. He said, PSPL is the only party, which is actually fighting against BJP.
Others who joined Shivpal’s party along with Adeeb include general secretary of All India Sunni Ulema Council Haji Mohammad Salim Saheb, former member of Haj Committee Of India Said Maksood Ashraf, lawyer Ashgar Khan Sahib, former president of AMU Students’ Union Faizul Hassan, National president of Rashtravadi Samaj Party, Chaudhary Jiaul Islam, Social worker, Javed Umar Farooqi, Nafis Akhtar Khan, Shahnshah, Haji Akhtar Kamal, Ishtiyak Ahmed Nijami, Mufran Ahmad Chand, Imran Ahmed, Abdul Razak Mansoori, Syed Hamman Ashraf, Indramani alias Pappu Yadav.