Akhilesh eyes UP bypolls as springboard for 2022 Assembly election, says BJP govt 'hides crime rate'

Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday said his party is set on returning to power in Uttar Pradesh in the 2022 assembly election and next month’s bypolls for seven seats will mark a beginning towards that goal. “The party’s target is the next assembly election and its beginning is being made through the coming by-elections in which SP’s performance would be good. The next elections will decide the future of the country’s politics,” the party chief told newspersons. He said his party’s efforts would be to connect with the maximum number of people and claimed that the voters of UP are prepared to remove the current state government. The bypolls to seven assembly seats in the state is scheduled for 3 November. As soon as the voters get a chance, everyone will see how this government is going to be defeated, the former chief minister said while welcoming members of different parties who joined the SP. Attacking the UP government for its performance on the law and order front, Yadav alleged that it hides the crime figures. There is not just one incident of crime against women but several that are being reported, he said. The 47-year-old opposition leader also welcomed the Allahabad High Court verdict on cow slaughter and said it would have taken detailed information on it. The High Court had on Monday raised concerns over misuse of the anti-cow slaughter law in UP to target innocent persons and lack of forensic evidence to prove that the recovered meat is beef. “Anyone writing the truth faces the wrath and jail. FIRs have also been written against the journalists who had written the truth,” he said. Questioning the state government on its handling of the coronavirus pandemic which has claimed lives of ministers and officials, he said that now it is being said that we have to live with it. “If so, why are the facilities not being improved in hospitals,” he asked. The former CM also questioned the ruling party for its promise to double the income of farmers saying that it was a mere slogan. He wanted the government to disclose how many schemes of the more than Rs 40 lakh crore worth MoUs that were signed by it have actually taken shape. “This is a jhoothi sarkar against which people are coming together,” he added. Hitting back at the SP chief, senior cabinet minister and UP government spokesperson Sidharth Nath Singh said, “Akhilesh perhaps sports a pair of magic glasses. He used to notice achievements of his government even if there was no performance or development and now that the BJP is completing his unfinished tasks, that too is not visible to him through his magic spectacles. “Even the state government’s fight against corona and its successful handling of the pandemic is not seen by him,” he said. Singh also said that the government under Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was going hammer and tongs against those ‘goondas’ who enjoyed protection during the SP regime and was demolishing their ill-gotten property and encroachments. He was apparently referring to the recent demolition of some houses owned by the kin of jailed gangster and BSP MLA Mukhtar Ansari in certain parts of Uttar Pradesh. Asked about the Supreme Court on Tuesday asking the Allahabad HC to monitor the probe in Hathras case, the UP minister said the investigation will bring out the facts. He said this will expose “those hatching a conspiracy” (against the government). The apex court earlier in the day said the CBI investigation in the Hathras case, in which a Dalit girl was allegedly brutally raped and died of injuries, is to be monitored by the Allahabad HC and the CRPF would provide security to the victim’s family and witnesses in the case.