Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Sunday said that minority communities were facing bias under the Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance government at the Centre, PTI reported. "Communal forces" were becoming stronger, and Muslims were being targeted "in the name of love jihad, gau raksha and religious conversion", Mayawati said at a rally in Lucknow on the occasion of BSP founder Kanshi Ram's death anniversary.

She further said that Muslims in Uttar Pradesh "should not waste" their votes on the Congress or the Samajwadi Party, saying it would only benefit the Bharatiya Janata Party. Mayawati believes the SP will lose the upcoming Assembly elections because of the "tussle for supremacy" between state Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle and state party president Shivpal Singh Yadav. "[The] Congress does not have a vote base [in Uttar Pradesh], and voting for it will also benefit the BJP," the BSP leader added.

Mayawati further emphasised that the BSP will not ally with any party for the Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Punjab state elections next year. Her remarks came as three people died and 28 others were injured in a stampede at her rally. More than one lakh people attended the event organised at Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar ground in the Uttar Pradesh capital.