BSP chief Mayawati has revived her demand to carve west Uttar Pradesh out as a separate state.

The former chief minister has asked her party cadres to tell the people of west Uttar Pradesh during their meetings that the BSP is in favour of reorganising the state, but the BJP and the Samajwadi Party are more interested in their own politics than welfare.

Mayawati was quoted by a senior BSP leader as saying in a closed-door meeting in Lucknow on Tuesday that her party would launch a campaign to carve west Uttar Pradesh out as a separate state. The west makes up for 26 of Uttar Pradesh’s 75 districts.

“There were over 500 district and state-level BSP leaders at the meeting. The party chief said the people must be reminded before the 2027 Assembly elections that the BSP was in support of smaller states for fast-paced development, but the rival parties were depriving people of their rights,” said the leader, who didn’t want to be named.

“She told the party leaders that the BJP governments in the state and at the Centre were indifferent to the problems of the people and it was a good time to snatch power from them in Uttar Pradesh,” he added.

Mayawati’s government had in 2008 passed a resolution in the Assembly to trifurcate Uttar Pradesh into three states — Bundelkhand, East Uttar Pradesh and West Uttar Pradesh. She had sent the proposal to the Centre but the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance had not shown any interest. She had again raised the demand in 2021 but it was ignored by the BJP-helmed National Democratic Alliance.