Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Wednesday said that the Bharatiya Janata Party was afraid of the growing strength of PDA and the pichhda, Dalit, alpsankhyak people would defeat the saffron party in Uttar Pradesh by-elections.

Akhilesh Yadav, who was in Hardoi on Wednesday, said: “They (BJP) have coined a new slogan as they are afraid of the PDA’s growing power. People are joining the PDA. We all know the origin of this slogan.”

Talking about the coming bypolls in Uttar Pradesh, the SP chief said, “The BJP will lose all nine seats in the state bypolls. Their (BJP) strategy is clear, first falsely implicate someone and then tarnish their image through media.”

Slamming the BJP over the ‘batenge toh katenge’ statement of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Akhilesh Yadav said the ruling party was frightened by the unity of PDA (pichhda, Dalit, alpsankhyak) people.

In an apparent dig at Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, who had on September 23 reiterated his ‘batenge toh katenge’ remark, Akhilesh Yadav said, “We (SP leaders) are doing the politics of social justice. PDA’s slogan is a progressive slogan. The BJP’s ‘batenge toh katenge’ slogan is a negative slogan. The BJP does politics of hatred and dividing the society.”

“The slogan has been prepared in a lab and the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh has been chosen to promote it. Such a negative slogan has never been heard in political history. PDA will unite and win. The BJP is scared and frightened by the unity of PDA. It does not have a solution to the problems of the people of Uttar Pradesh, that is why it has come up with such a negative and one of the worst slogans in history,” he noted.

The SP chief claimed that whatever infrastructure and development are visible today in Uttar Pradesh is because of the Samajwadi Party. “The public knows everything. The new generations want progressive, development and positive politics. The negative politics of the BJP will never succeed now. People have come to know that the BJP cheats and lies,” the SP chief said.