BSP questions EC’s decision on statues

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Congress candidate Karamjit Rintu with his supporters before filing nomination papers from the Amritsar Assembly seat on Thursda

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has questioned the Election Commission (EC) for its intentions in conducting free and fir elections in UP.
In a letter written to the Chief Election Commissioner S.Y. Qureshi, BSP general secretary Satish Chandra Misra has said that the EC’s decision to cover statues of Mayawati and elephants was not in conformity with law. Mr Misra has termed the decision as one-sided and biased.
He said in the letter that while the EC had taken note of the BSP symbol, it had chosen to ignore the symbols of other parties like the cycle (Samajwadi Party), lotus (BJP), hand pump (RLD) and the hand (Congress). He further said that Dalits were feeling upset over the EC decision.
However, the letter added that the BSP would continue to cooperate with the EC in conducting free and fair polls in the state.
Meanwhile, the Mayawati government has gone a step further and decided to shut down all parks and monuments till the elections are over.
Though no formal announcement of this has been made by the state government, public entry has been barred to parks that allow ticket-based entry.
Initially, on Wednesday, it was believed that the parks had been closed to facilitate draping of statues since the deadline for the same ended on Wednesday evening.
However, on Thursday too when entry was denied to visitors at the parks, the security supervisors at Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar Samajik Parivartan Sthal informed that all the parks would remain closed during the election period.
There are nine such parks in the city dedicated to dalit icons and built at an estimated `3,500 crores.
Also, on Thursday, the Election Commission said that it had issued no directive for closure of parks and had no information about it either.