Leaders of the ruling Samajwadi Party (SP), which was almost routed in the state in the Lok Sabha polls, may be advancing various reasons for their dismal showing but senior party leader and minister Azam Khan has an altogether different explanation for the defeat of the party.





Instead of blaming the party for the defeat, Azam virtually lambasted the people for not being grateful to the SP government, which had done so much for them.



Azam, who could not even ensure a victory for the SP in his den of Rampur, said on Sunday in a sarcastic tone that they had lost the polls because the state government had given many facilities to the people of Rampur.



“The people of Rampur have shown their true character, they cooled themselves owing to uninterrupted power supply. They also travelled on good roads but did not support us”, Khan said in Rampur, his home district.



“The people of Rampur have a big heart”, he went on to say sarcastically. A bitter Azam said that the electorate of Rampur had ‘betrayed’ the cause of socialism.



Incidentally, Rampur being the home district of Khan, is among the few districts which gets round-the-clock power supply while a majority of UP districts suffer from 10 to 12 hours of power cut daily.



The SP had given ticket from Rampur seat, where muslims constitute around 49 per cent of the electorate, to a relative of Azam Khan in the hope that he would be able to get the support of the people there.



The seat, which was held by film actress turned politician Jaya Prada, who had shifted to Bijnore this time, was wrested by BJP's Nepal Singh. Singh defeated SP's Nasir Ahmed Khan by over 23 thousand votes. The SP has managed to win only five of the 80 seats in the state.