Lucknow: Serious differences have cropped up within the BJP on the issue of tainted former BSP ministers, especially Babu Singh Kushwaha, joining the party with a senior MP fearing it could boomerang in the upcoming polls.
"The corrupt leaders in Mayawati and Mulayam Singh
Yadav`s parties are being taken in the BJP keeping in mind
Assembly elections. This could prove harmful for the party.
Such people should neither be allowed to join the party nor be
given ticket to contest elections," firebrand BJP MP Yogi
Adityanath told agency over phone from Gorakhpur.
The Gorakhpur MP alleged that some national leaders
belonging to the state were "conspiring" to weaken the party`s
fight, based on ideology, instead of increasing its mass base.
If party workers were ignored by giving tickets to
"corrupt turncoats" then he would not campaign for such
candidates and if needed would also oppose them, Adityanath
said.
"How can a person, who was corrupt in Mulayam and
Mayawati`s party, become clean after joining BJP," he asked.
"The party will have to suffer if the trend continues,"
he added.
He said that such persons, who are promoting corrupt
people in the BJP should be identified as it was a conspiracy
against the party.
Kushwaha, former family welfare minister of Uttar
Pradesh, is accused of irregularities in the implementation of
the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) funds.
He joined BJP on Tuesday.
Senior party leaders including L K Advani and Murli
Manohar Joshi are said to be opposed to the decision to bring
in the former minister, who was sacked by Chief Minister
Mayawati and expelled from BSP in November last year.
Meanwhile, party state President Surya Pratap Shahi
defended Kushwaha and termed CBI searches at his Lucknow
residence in connection with National Rural Health Mission
scam a "biased action".
"CBI has become Congress Bureau of Investigation..It
is working in a biased manner...Kushwaha`s joining the party
is not digested by SP, BSP and Congress. The CBI action is on
direction of Congress so that it can gain political mileage,"
Shahi said in a statement issued here.
The party had earlier suspended state executive member
IP Singh for raising his voice against Kushwaha`s joining the
BJP.
PTI
