Mayawati woos upper castes, expels anti-Brahmin leaders

LUCKNOW: In an apparent attempt to woo the upper caste, Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Tuesday expelled her party former MP Kapilmuni Kawariya and his MLC brother Suraj Bhan on charges that they did not allowed other Brahmins leaders to grow in her party. The Kanwariya brothers are from the Brahmin community.
BSP zonal coordinators, RK Chaudhary, Indrajeet Saroj and Akhilesh Ambedkar, in a joint statement said the two leaders were engaged in anti-party activities during 2014 Lok Sabha elections.The two did not allowed other Brahmin leaders to grow. That dented the party prospects in the Lok Sabha elections,'' they said.
Kapilmuni Kanwariya, who was elected from Phulpur constituency in Allahabad in 2009, could not retain his seat in 2014. His brother Suraj Bhan's tenure as MLC expired only on January 15 earlier this year.
Accused of murdering Samajwadi Party MLA from Jhusi, Jawahar Yadav alias Jawahar Pandit in 1996, the two were sentenced to jail by a district court in April 2015. Yadav's widow, Vijma Yadav is currently SP MLA from Pratappur assembly constituency.
Mayawati had been expelling various leaders from the upper caste soon after her party humiliating defeat in 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The first to be shown the door was former BSP minister Rakesh Dhar Tripathi and his nephew Pankaj Tripathi. The duo were said to be hobnobbing with the BJP. Incidentally, Rakesh Dhar Tripathi was also a minister in the Kalyan Singh government in UP. Mayawati later expelled BSP Rajya Sabha MP, Akhilesh Das and subsequently MP Dara Singh Chauhan on charges of anti party activities.
In another indication of BSP chief surrendering her social engineering formula, Mayawati did not chose any upper caste leaders for Rajya Sabha in 2015. She, instead, opted for two dalit leaders, Raja Ram and Veer Singh. Mayawati has also been trying to woo the Muslim leaders to broaden her vote bank which is otherwise restricted to dalits.