Bahujan Samaj Party president and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Maywati claimed in Lucknow on Saturday that both the Congress and Bhartiya Janata Party tried to bait her into aligning with them in 2004 Lok Sabha polls.
She had convened a meeting of BSP MPs, legislators and all office bearers right down to the grassroots level from all corners of UP at the sprawling party state headquarters in the Lucknow's posh Mall Avenue.
The meeting, which was more like a monologue by the party chief, appeared like a diktat to the rank and file, who listened to her in pin drop silence.
All roads around the venue were shut to the public, leading to chaos and prolonged traffic jams on the remaining thoroughfares in the neighbourhood.
Media was, however, kept at an arm's length, except for camera persons who were allowed a very brief photo opportunity .
While a press release later issued by the party was limited to the instructions that Mayawati gave to the office-bearers, some insiders disclosed a lot more that happened within the heavily guarded four walls.
She was stated to have told the gathering how BJP and the Congress tried to lure her into an alliance which she turned down. "It started with the BJP offering to support me endlessly as chief minister in 2004, provided I agreed to contest the then Lok Sabha election in alliance with them; top BJP leadership also threatened to withdraw support in case I did not agree to sign the deal," she said.
"But I knew that such an alliance was not in the larger interest of our party, so I chose to part ways with them," she was stated to have told the gathering.
"No sooner than I spurned the BJP offer, Congress came forward with another alluring offer by promising to withdraw all the false cases framed against me, if I agreed to align with them," she said.
"However, realising that even though it could have benefited me personally, such an alliance could be detrimental to our party and the BSP movement, I said a flat 'no' to the Congress, because the party's interest always stood well above my personal interests," she pointed out amidst cheers.
"I am aware that I was falsely implicated in these cases simply because I refused to toe either the BJP or the Congress line," she said, while asserting ,"Well, we are fighting out the CBI in the country's highest court and in case we fail to get justice, we will go to the court of the people."
Mayawati also made it a point to impress upon partymen how Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre 'had been continuously discriminating with her government by repeatedly denying the state its due.'
She also laid much emphasis on maintenance of discipline in the party ranks. "I have not acted in complaints of indiscipline by some party workers at the recently concluded panchayat elections, but if such acts are repeated in future, no one would be spared," she warned.
