New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav on Thursday said he made a "blunder" by "propping up" Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) after the demolition of Babri Masjid but rubbished predictions that Mayawati's party could topple him in the next Assembly elections due within 10 months.
"We face no challenge in the forthcoming elections from Mayawati's BSP or Congress or BJP," said the Samajwadi Party (SP) leader.
In an assessment of other rival parties, he said the condition of BJP was "not good" as the days of the issues like Ayodhya, Mathura and Kashi have become a thing of the past as competition today was for development.
As for Congress, he dismissed suggestions that the party held the key to power after the Assembly elections.
He said that the Congress position was "worse than" BJP and the party was "visible" only in Lucknow and Delhi.
Explaining the "blunder" of propping up BSP in the 1993 Assembly elections, a year after the Babri Masjid demolition, Yadav said, "There were only two kinds of people, those who waned to demolish the masjid and those who wanted to save it. Now I realise that support to BSP at that time was a blunder."
The SP supremo said during the 1993 elections the BSP had given an "unfair deal" to his party in the tie-up by cornering winnable seats, yet his party secured the largest number of seats.
He parried queries on the Jan Dal floated by former Prime Minister V P Singh and Democratic People's Front launched by noted Muslim leaders, but lashed out at the Congress party.
He accused Sonia Gandhi and her colleagues of playing "negative" politics by targeting his party leaders and sympathisers.
Yadav said the OBC quota issue was unlikely to benefit Congress as it had already been implemented in the state in 1994.
He was upbeat about the prospects of the Third Front nationally but did not foresee the downfall of the Congress-led UPA coalition at the Centre which he said has become "unpopular" on issues like price rise and wheat imports.
Asked about the possibility of Lok Sabha elections being held simultaneously with elections in his state, Yadav said it was unlikely as the Manmohan Singh Government was being "run" by the Left parties which were "our friends".
About SP's strategy on whether it would go it alone or forge any alliance, Yadav said, "We already have an alliance with Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) headed by Ajit Singh, which is a natural alliance.”
“There are many more alliances in the offing. Since 1994, there have been alliances against us but each time we have emerged stronger," he added.
He refuted reports that Ajit Singh would part ways with him on the eve of elections saying such "rumours" were being floated ever since he joined the SP-led government.
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