Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath attacked the Opposition in the State Assembly on Monday. He took a veiled swipe at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav without naming them.
“There are two namoone in the country, one in Delhi and the other in Lucknow. Whenever there’s a discussion in the country, these individuals run away,” said Yogi Adityanath, speaking during the second day of the winter session of the Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Sabha, Adityanath responded to the allegations raised by the Samajwadi Party over an alleged illegal trade in codeine-based cough syrup. He dismissed the charge as politically driven and used sharp language to question the intent of the Opposition. “And I think the same thing is happening with your ‘Babua’. He will also leave the country again for a trip to England, and you people will keep shouting here,” he added. In his rallies, Adityanath often refers to Akhilesh Yadav as ‘Babua’.
The Samajwadi Party has alleged that the illegal syrup trade runs into thousands of crores of rupees and has claimed that hundreds of children lost their lives due to the racket. The Bharatiya Janata Party-led state government has strongly denied these allegations.
Rejecting the Opposition’s claims, Adityanath said the issue appeared to be “politically motivated” and alleged links between those involved and the SP. “I think if you delve deeper into this, it all boils down to the same thing: that somehow, some leader or individual associated with the Samajwadi Party is involved,” he said.
“The transaction in the syrup case that took place also went through the account of an office-bearer of the Samajwadi Party’s Lohia Vahini. The STF is investigating this,” he added.
Akhilesh Yadav hit back sharply, calling the Chief Minister’s remarks an “open admission of internal discord within the BJP.” Reacting both in the Assembly and later on social media platform X, the former Chief Minister said the comment reflected a deeper rift between the party’s leadership in Delhi and Lucknow. “Self-admission! No one had expected that the Delhi-Lucknow fight would reach this point. People holding constitutional positions should maintain at least some sense of propriety and not cross the limits of decorum,” Yadav wrote in his post.
He also took a swipe at the ruling party, cautioning it against washing its dirty linen in public. “BJP leaders should not bring their party’s internal infighting to the crossroads. If someone takes offence, they may have to retreat.”
