Bahujan Samaj Party President Mayawati on Monday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party of using Dr BR Ambedkar’s name for political mileage.

“In the four and a half years of governance, the BJP did only drama, especially towards Dalits,” ANI quoted her as saying. “Modi ji spoke of BR Ambedkar in ‘Mann ki Baat’, but his mindset is the stark opposite of what Babasaheb stood for. That is the reason the BJP and RSS were kept out of power in the past decades.”

The Bahujan Samaj Party chief made the remarks at the end of a meeting with the party’s zonal coordinators at the BSP’s headquarters in Lucknow.

Mayawati said the BJP’s anti-Dalit politics was evident from the fact that it had resorted to “malpractices” to defeat the BSP’s Rajya Sabha candidate, Bhim Rao Ambedkar. “They chant Ambedkar’s name but oppress those belonging to the category,” she said.

On Saturday, she had accused the BJP of “creating an environment of fear” that led to cross-voting and resulted in the victory of the saffron party-backed candidate in a Rajya Sabha election in Uttar Pradesh. She had emphasised that this would not affect the BSP’s ties with the Samajwadi Party.

The BSP and Samajwadi Party had united to defeat the BJP in the bye-elections for the Gorakhpur and Phulpur seats.

The Dalit leader on Monday accused the BJP of attempting to create differences between the BSP and Samajwadi Party.

“The BSP’s close ties with the Samajwadi Party are not for any selfish motive but in national interest,” PTI quoted her as saying. “BSP and SP workers will not fall prey to the BJP’s designs in the interests of the nation and the people. We, along with all Opposition parties, will have to definitely stop them from coming to power at the Centre this time.”

Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav also emphasised that the alliance between the two parties would remain. “The victory of the BJP in the ninth seat, contested by the saffron party with the help of money power, has given the SP an opportunity to expose the communal outfit’s anti-Dalit face,” he said on Sunday, according to PTI. “Because of the conspiracy the BJP hatched against a Dalit getting elected, the SP-BSP unity has strengthened all the more for the Lok Sabha polls.”