Encouraged by its success in the Lok Sabha election courtesy its ‘Pichada, Dalit, alpasankhyak’ (PDA), or ‘backwards, Dalits and minorities’, plank, the Samajwadi Party (SP) is planning to hold PDA panchayats across villages in Uttar Pradesh with an eye on the next Uttar Pradesh Assembly election scheduled in 2027.
With these panchayats, the party aims to sensitise the communities about their rights and the alleged discrimination the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has done against them.
“We are planning to hold PDA panchayats to educate the backwards, Dalits and minorities about attacks on their rights by the BJP and how they (the BJP) are planning to play with the Constitution. It is going to be our first major exercise after the Lok Sabha polls and is focused on the Assembly elections. We will be aiming to reach maximum villages with senior leaders addressing the public,” Sunil Singh Yadav ‘Sajan’, the SP national spokesperson and a close aide of party president Akhilesh Yadav, said.
The SP leader said the dates of the panchayats “will be finalised soon”.
In January, the SP had organised a ‘PDA fortnight’ in all the 403 Assembly constituencies of the State. The PDA plank dominated the Lok Sabha election campaign of the SP with Mr. Akhilesh highlighting that the deprived sections need to be united against the BJP. The SP distributed roughly 70% tickets to candidates from these communities and the strategy paid off with the party winning 37 out of the 62 Lok Sabha seats it contested, limiting the BJP’s tally to only 33 seats.
Published - June 20, 2024 04:46 am IST
