india

Updated: Dec 09, 2019 06:27 IST

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) president Mayawati on Sunday directed party leaders and office bearers to start preparations to win the assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh in 2022.

She was speaking at a meeting of the UP state unit office bearers at the party’s office on Mall Avenue in Lucknow.

Chairing the meeting, she expressed concern over the ‘slack membership drive’ and constitution of booth committees. She directed the party leaders to expedite the organizational work.

She asked the office bearers to remove shortcomings in functioning of the organization. In a press release, BSP said the party chief reviewed the working of the organization in 75 districts. All the district presidents and senior office bearers of the state unit participated in the meeting.

While gathering feedback about the programmes organised across the state to mark the death anniversary of Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar on December 6, Mayawati reminded the party leaders about Ambedkar’s instructions to capture power for empowerment of the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and religious minorities.

The BSP will have to capture power in the 2022 assembly election in UP, she said.

“The stand taken by the party chief vis-a-vis the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was praised. There is a positive discussion among people regarding the stand taken by the party,” the statement issued by the BSP said.

On December 5, Mayawati had described the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill as “unconstitutional and divisive”, and demanded that it be sent to a parliamentary committee for a review.

“Citizenship in the name of religion and discrimination in the name of religion of citizens through it is totally against the basic structure of the humanitarian and secular Constitution of Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar,” she had said.

“Instead of forcing this bill, like demonetisation and GST, the central government should review it,” she said.

“It should be sent to a parliamentary committee for better deliberations so that this bill could come before people in a proper manner that is in consonance with the Constitution,” the BSP chief had said.

She also expressed concern over the incidents of rape, murder and the tendency to kill women by setting them ablaze in UP and in the rest of the country, the BSP statement read.