"It Will Help": BJP Ally On Tie-Up With Top Backward Castes Leader In UP

UP elections 2022: Anupriya Patel's Apna Dal (S) has a support base among Kurmis in eastern UP and is currently the BJP's biggest ally in the state.

Apna Dal (Sonelal) chief Anupriya Patel has indicated the BJP-led alliance in Uttar Pradesh, which includes her party, is interested in bringing in Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party chief Om Prakash Rajbhar back into the National Democratic Alliance, or NDA.

Ms Patel's Apna Dal has a support base among Kurmis in eastern UP and is currently the BJP's biggest ally in the state. The alliance dates back to the 2014 national elections, when the BJP won 71 of the state's 80 seats. Apna Dal had added two more seats to the tally.

"It would help if Rajbhar re-joined the NDA," Ms Patel told NDTV today.

Mr Rajbhar's party, SBSP, was in an alliance with the BJP in the last UP assembly election, after which he was even made a minister in the state government. But he left the NDA just before the general elections in 2019.