Predicting a hung Assembly in the coming polls, Rashtriya lok Dal (RlD) president Ajit Singh said that his party will not ally with the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) with an aim to keep it away from power.
However, Singh did not open his cards about the possible post-poll allies and maintained that till now his party was fighting to form a government in UP projectiung his son Jayant Chaudhary as the CM face.
“At present we are contesting in the state with full energy and after a long time, the RlD is contesting in eastern and central UP,” he said.
Addressing media persons in lucknow on Friday, Singh said that the RlD will be a force in the state after the elections. “The party has announced 130 seats so far and by Saturday the number will go up by an additional 150. Even as Jayant has been announced as the CM face of the party, he will not contest Assembly elections,” said the RlD boss.
Singh reiterated that no one from the SP or Congress spoke to him on alliance. “It is the media which kept the alliance issue alive, but it was not true,” he said.
When asked as to why was the RlD fielding those who were denied tickets by the BJP, SP and other parties, Singh said that such things were normal during elections and tickets were being given to those who could win. Several former legislators from other parties joined the RlD and most of them are set to contest elections.
Meanwhile, RlD announced a list of 20 candidates for the Assembly polls on Friday and the list include Ram Kumar Kashyap (Nakud), Bhura Malik (Saharanpur City), Rajesh Chauhan (Gangoh), Harpal Saini (Thakurdwara), Abdul Rauf Malik (Moradabad City), Deshpal Dhobi (Bisauli), Manoj Upadhyay (Bilsi), Jitendra Singh Yadav (Dataganj), Priyavan Gangwar (Bahedi), Ganga Singh Verma (Meerganj), Aslam Saifi (Nawabganj), Gaurav Gautam (Shahjahanpur), Rajeshwari Rajvansi (Balamau), Vishnu Pratap Singh Chauhan (Vidhuna), Vikram Singh lodhi (Fatehpur Cantt.), Sudhir Kisan (Bansi), Anupama Arya (Pipraich), Dhananjay Singh Pahalwan (Khadda), Anshuman Singh (Hata) and Dev Prakash Rai (Ghosi).