After ditching Mayawati and partying with Azam Khan, SP Maurya joins BJP

LUCKNOW: Exactly one and half months after leaving the BSP, Swami Prasad Maurya joined the BJP on Monday in presence of Amit Shah, Om Mathur and Keshav Prasad Maurya. A big catch, Maurya who was a close aide of Mayawati and served as a minister thrice in BSP regimes, is a prominent OBC face in UP. He was being wooed by both the ruling Samajwadi Party, which was pretty sure initially of inducting

Maurya, and the BJP, which ultimately managed to bag him.  Maurya who had floated a political front Loktantrik Bahujan Manch, after rebeling against Mayawati, was slated to hold a rally of his fledgling organisation on September 22. But it was the persistent effort of Om Mathur that led to Maurya being convinced to formally join the BJP.

Mathur met Maurya couple of times and also took him to meet BJP national President Amit Shah twice, which ultimately led to Maurya making up his mind in favour of BJP.

The BJP despite its clean sweep of UP in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, is struggling to find the right calculus to win the state assembly polls early next year.

The party is hoping to strike a grand OBC consolidation and the induction of Maurya, the BSP's foremost OBC face is the right fit for the party as it gears up for polls, feel its strategists. Maurya, along with Kurmi, Koeri and Kushwaha are among the most influential non-Yadav OBC castes.

The BJP has already made Keshav Prasad Maurya its state party chief and with Swami Prasad Maurya also coming on its bandwagon hopes to strike deep into the votebank. It has promoted several Kurmi leaders and recently amde its ally Anupriya Patel (Kurmi) a union minister.

Mayawati's ex aide Babu Singh Kushwaha, whose wife contested as a Samajwadi Party candidate in 2014 and later walked out of the party, is also working to wean away the Kushwaha community away from the BSP, which the BJP hopes will come its way.

It was this caste fit that the BJP realised makes SP Maurya one of the biggest Most Backward Caste leaders in the state, a crucial catch and the party finally won him over.