The Bahujan Samaj Party’s (BSP) hopes of growing into a pan-India party have not found a resonance in Pune. Having fielded candidates for all the 21 Assembly constituencies in Pune, the party could poll only 1 lakh votes even as its state aggregate was 15 lakh votes for 282 candidates.

“It has been a poor performance. It was the third front alliance (RLDF) that dented our traditional vote bank this time,” said BSP state president Vilas Garud. The party had taken credit for fielding the largest number of candidates by a single party in the state. They polled only 3 per cent, much lower than the 4.16 per cent votes it polled in 2004 Assembly elections.

The BSP members will meet on Saturday in Mumbai to take a stock of the situation. While blaming the third front for its poor performance, the party also believes the Congress-NCP alliance made inroads into its Dalit vote bank.

City Congress president Abhay Chhajed said BSP could not keep blaming others if even after 10 years of presence in the state it could not bag a single seat. “The party has no foothold in the district or the state. It is not faring well even in Uttar Pradesh now and there is no chance that they would do well elsewhere,” he said.

With the state having nearly 30 per cent Dalit votes, it was widely expected that BSP would cut into the Congress votes this time, especially in Pune, where its Lok Sabha candidate D S Kulkarni, polled an impressive 62,981 votes in the April elections.

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