With all parties uniting against Bharatiya Janata Party and Congress giving a call for ‘Bharat Bandh’ against rising fuel prices on Monday, a senior Minister in the Yogi Adityanath Government, Shrikant Sharma, said the Opposition unity was a farce and asked them to declare who would lead them in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
“The so-called mahagathbandhan has no meaning in Uttar Pradesh. The Opposition parties should first choose their leader and tell the people who will lead the mahagathbandhan in the coming Lok Sabha elections,” Sharma, who is also the Government spokesman, told The Pioneer.
Sharma said the BJP had a charismatic leader in Narendra Modi under whose leadership India had emerged as a global power. He said the Opposition did not have a leader to match Modi. “And if they have any, they should name him,” he added.
Sharma said it was very easy to mislead people and that was what the opposition parties were doing.
“The opposition leaders are saying that the BJP governments at the Centre and in the state have failed to deliver. They are giving sermons about sufferings of people. If that is true, why are they forging an alliance?” he asked, adding that the opposition parties were talking about maha-gathbandhan because they knew that the BJP was invincible.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath have delivered and their projects are being appreciated by the masses,” he added.
Sharma’s barbs were directed more towards Congress as he said what could one say about a party which celebrated its defeat in Karnataka. “This is a grand old party of India but look at its predicament, it has become a non-entity in the politically crucial states like Uttar Pradesh,” he said.
Sharma, who is state Power Minister, said that the so-called grand alliance in UP between all the major players like Bahujan Samaj Party, Samajwadi Party and Congress would have no impact on the popularity of the BJP.
“We will sweep the polls in Uttar Pradesh under the able leadership of Narendra Modi and Yogi Adityanath. Modi will be the next Prime Minister. This is for sure,” he declared.
Regarding Akhilesh Yadav, he said the Samajwadi Party national president was yet to learn the intricacies of politics.
“In 2017, he entered into an alliance with Congress when he was on a strong footing, and suffered humiliating defeat. This should have been an experience to learn from for the SP leader but he is still talking about going ahead with Congress. This shows his political immaturity,” he said.