Arch rivals BSP supremo Mayawati and Samajwadi Party national president Akhilesh Yadav will share the dais for the first time at a rally in Patna in August, convened by RJD President Lalu Yadav.

While the BJP is working hard to prevent any alliance between BSP and Samajwadi party, Lalu Yadav is doing everything possible to bring Akhilesh and Mayawati together on one platform, which he sees as the beginning of a grand alliance.

Before the elections results in UP were announced Akhilesh Yadav had said that he was willing to join hands with Mayawati to stop BJP coming to power in the anticipation that the party would fail to secure a clear majority. But Mayawati was cool to the suggestion, saying her strategy would depend on the results.

Significantly, Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati have stopped criticising each other publicly as the BJP is constantly on their radar, whether it is the issue of demonetization or the deterioration in the law and order situation under the Yogi Government.

In the past, SP and BSP had joined hands to ensure victory for BSP founder Kanshi Ram in the Itawah by-election. Then again in order to stop BJP from coming to power riding on the Hindutva wave in the 1993 assembly election after the demolition of Babri Masjid, BSP and Samajwadi Party came together to install a coalition government with Mulayam Singh Yadav as the chief minister.

But an incident at the state guest house on June 2 1995 when Mayawati alleged an attack on her by Mulayam Singh and his MLAs created a rift between the two parties. Since then Mulayam Singh and Mayawati never lost any opportunity to attack each other.

The situation changed with Akhilesh Yadav taking over as national president of Samajwadi Party replacing his father Mulayam Singh as the son was willing to enter into an alliance with BSP and other parties to stop BJP. Akhilesh had already entered into an alliance with Congress and Rahul Gandhi in the UP assembly polls.

But riding on the Narendra Modi wave and the communal polarization, the BJP upset Akhilesh’s apple cart by winning an unprecedented 325 seats in the election while SP and BSP suffered huge losses.

Now there is realization in all the parties, including the SP, BSP, Congress and others, that unless they join hands it would be difficult to take on the BJP, which is already consolidating the communal polarization. They also realize that the BJP was playing the Hindutva card very well under the leadership of Yogi Adityanath to playing up the Ram Janambhumi issue ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

Much significance is being attached in this regard to the chief minister’s recent visit to Ayodhya, where he said he would strive for an out of court settlement to the problem by talking to all factions involved in the court case pending in the Supreme Court.

Political pundits point out that had the SP, BSP and Congress joined hands in the UP elections, the BJP would have got only 90 seats. At the same it is not so simple for Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati to come together as both are known to have king-size egos and have been playing one-upmanship with each other and both have nurse aspirations to become the senior partner in the mahagathbandhan. The BJP realizes that the anti-incumbency factor could work against it and therefore formation of a mahagathbandhan could damage its chances in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. (IPA)