Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav Thursday said his party has not received an invitation to attend the Rahul Gandhi-led Congress’s Bharat Jodo Yatra, which will resume from a break in Uttar Pradesh on January 3, 2023, news agency ANI reported.
Addressing reporters in Lucknow, Yadav said, “We have not received any invitation (for Bharat Jodo Yatra). The ideology of our party is different. BJP and Congress both are same”.
Uttar Pradesh | We have not received any invitation (for Bharat Jodo Yatra). The ideology of our party is different. BJP and Congress both are same: Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, in Lucknow pic.twitter.com/qPMxdtaF5x
— ANI UP/Uttarakhand (@ANINewsUP) December 29, 2022
Yadav’s comment comes despite the Congress’s claim that it had sent an invitation to several leaders of non-BJP parties, including Akhilesh Yadav, BSP supremo Mayawati and RLD’s Jayant Chaudhary, to take part in the UP leg of the Bharat Jodo Yatra.
Earlier, on Monday, while responding to questions by reporters on whether he plans to accept Rahul’s invite, Akhilesh dodged from answering the question directly and asked, “Humari bhavna hai ki Bharat jodo, humari bhavna hai uske saath. Lekin sawal ye hai ki BJP hatayega kaun (We too believe in uniting India, we are in agreement on it. But the question is who will tackle the BJP)?”
SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary also told The Indian Express it was “unlikely” for the SP chief to attend the Yatra as there were “party programmes lined up”. Chaudhary also stressed that the party had not received any formal invite, a position taken by the Bahujan Samaj Party as well.
The Uttar Pradesh leg of the Yatra will enter Ghaziabad’s Loni area on January 3 and travel to Haryana via Shamli’s Kairana. The next day, the yatra will reach Mavi Kalan in Baghpat and pass through Baghpat city and Sisana, Sarurpur and Barot in the same district. On January 5, the yatra will reach Alam in Shamli district and pass through Kandhla, Uncha village and Kairana.
