Vote for me and my Samajwadi Party otherwise I will go to jail,” this has been UP CM Mulayam Singh Yadav’s opening line in many an election speech. Flush with the exhilarating expectation that she is in the lead, his Rival Number 1, BSP chief Mayawati is rubbing it in.

In rally after rally she has talked of launching a probe against Mulayam but today, speaking to a rapturous audience here, she underlined it more forcefully than ever.

“The goonda, badmash and mafia raj of Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh will be over the moment I come to power. They have looted the state, from Lucknow to Noida, in the last three years without interruption, and so afraid are they about the BSP coming to power that they will attempt to run and hide in Delhi or Mumbai. Everyone knows they have sent a lot of money abroad, so they may even run to a foreign country. However, I promise not to let them flee, and ensure that the two, and their henchmen and accomplices, are made to pay for their crimes...I will immediately launch a probe and put them behind bars if they are guilty.”

If this vitriol and denunciation was not enough, Mayawati took another swipe against the SP duo by aligning them with their purported rival, the BJP. “There is a secret understanding between the two parties to defeat the BSP,” she warned the audience, “and they have entered the maidan after signing a pact...”

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