Mayawati targets Congress, calls Mahatma 'natakbaaz'

On Rahul Gandhi’s birthday (June 19), Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati will launch a fresh attack on the Congress.

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) will launch a nationwide ‘sharam karo’ (have shame) agitation on  that day to expose “casteist  political parties” (read Congress).

Sources said the BSP chief was rattled by UP Congress president Rita Bahuguna Joshi’s announcement that the junior Gandhi’s birthday would be celebrated as Samtamoolak Diwas (egalitarianism day) in the state. Under this programme, Congress leaders and workers would visit houses of Dalits, break bread with them and try to understand their problems à la Rahul Gandhi.

In a booklet — copies of which will be released on June 19, Mayawati has not even spared Mahatma Gandhi, terming his efforts for Dalit welfare ‘natakbaazi’ (drama). She has lashed out at politicians “who put up a drama of sleeping in the houses of Dalits and eating with them only to get their votes... Gandhiji also did this drama throughout his lifetime”.

Bristling with anger over the BSP’s poor performance, Mayawati seems to be consumed by an apprehension that the Congress would dent her Dalit votebank.

Political observers said after the Lok Sabha election, the BSP is reverting to its original Dalit agenda as Mayawati has realised that her experiments at luring the upper castes have failed.

Reacting to Mayawati’s behaviour,  Rita Bahuguna Joshi said, “Mayawati seems to have lost her senses.She should apologise to the country for her remarks against Gandhiji. It’s shocking to see a serving CM insult the father of the nation.”