BJP knows how to get votes: Tikait

Muzaffarnagar (Uttar Pradesh), March 11 (IANS) Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) spokesman Rakesh Tikait has said the BJP worked only to garner the maximum votes and has been successful in doing that.

"We held farmer agitation successfully for 13 months. We are 'andolankari' and BJP is 'votekaari'. This time, all political parties took farmers seriously and included their welfare in their manifestos. It does not matter who wins but they must fulfil farmers' demands and needs, and work for their betterment and fulfil the promises they have made," said Rakesh Tikait while talking to reporters.

Tikait had been campaigning against the BJP and its policies and had even appealed to farmers to not vote for the party.

Asked about the impact of farmers' agitation on Uttar Pradesh's Assembly election, Tikait said, "Farmer movement has done enough damage to the BJP. They have lost several seats in west UP which they had won in the last polls."

In Muzaffarnagar, he said, the SP-RLD alliance had wrested four of the six seat seats from the BJP.

Among them was Budhana constituency in which Tikait's village is located.

Rajpal Baliyan from the RLD defeated BJP MLA Umesh Malik there.

"But BJP won as UP is a large state and the party knows how to get votes irrespective of the means it employs to do so. On the one hand, it makes people poor, and, on the other, plays the communal card to divide communities. This strategy is being executed all across the country," he said.

Reiterating that farmers' struggle would continue, Tikait said, "We will make a committee now and ensure that the BJP addresses farmer-related issues."