The Hindu : Mayawati a pawn in BJP's hand: Amar Singh

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 15, 2003

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National

Mayawati a pawn in BJP's hand: Amar Singh

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI APRIL 14. The Samajwadi Party general secretary, Amar Singh, today alleged that the State Government had registered criminal cases against him and the party president, Mulayam Singh Yadav, at the behest of the BJP.

Reacting to the 137 cases registered against Mr. Yadav, the party leader, Azam Khan, and himself, Mr. Singh said the Chief Minister could not have launched such an attack without a directive from the Centre. "Ms. Mayawati is being used by the BJP as a pawn in its game plan to regain control over Uttar Pradesh."

On the charge that Mr. Yadav had misused the discretionary fund, he said the matter had been scrutinised and cleared by the High Court, the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Assembly.

He also questioned the rationale of raising the issue at this juncture; more so when the BSP had itself been party to the clearance given by the Assembly.

As for the cases against him, Mr. Singh said he had never held public office. Also, he was even been a member of the Samajwadi Party during Mr. Yadav's two stints as Chief Minister.

On the charge that the incriminating tapes given by the SP to the Uttar Pradesh Governor was his handiwork, he said: "I wish I had made those tapes. But the truth is that someone in her camp gave those tapes to us and we decided to hand it over to the Governor as per protocol knowing full well his RSS credentials."

Asserting that the Samajwadi Party had done its bit by going public with evidence that came its way, Mr. Singh said the onus of proving the contents in the tape false was on Ms. Mayawati. "Let the Government institute a CBI enquiry to verify the authenticity of the tapes."

Aware that he along with Mr. Yadav and Mr. Khan could be behind bars by Tuesday morning given the criminal cases registered against them, Mr. Singh said in view of the "politics of vendetta" unleashed by Ms. Mayawati, party workers had been instructed to proceed with the month-long "cycle yatra", beginning on April 19, against the "machinations" of the BSP-BJP Government in the State, as scheduled.

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