BSP to celebrate Mayawati birthday as 'jan kalyankari diwas'

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) will celebrate the birthday of its President Mayawati as 'Jan Kalyankari Diwas' on January 15.

The BSP leaders have also been asked to use the occasion to mobilise the cadre after the recent political developments in Maharashtra Assembly elections and bypolls in Uttar Pradesh.

According to party sources, the main celebration is likely to be held in Lucknow while all district units of the party will celebrate the birthday in their districts.

The leaders have been directed to help the poor on this day.

The party will also revive its fundraising drive on the occasion, and party MPs and MLAs will donate money for the party fund on this day.

The BSP had briefly suspended its fund raising drive on the occasion of Mayawati's birthday in 2009 when an engineer was lynched by a BSP MLA Shekhar Tiwari.

The engineer had refused to give money for the fund raising drive and was lynched by the MLA and his henchmen.

The controversy after the incident forced Mayawati to deny that her birthday celebrations were an occasion for collecting money for the party.

"My party workers give donations willingly for the party and there is no question of using any force," she had said.

She also had said that her party did not get any donations from industrialists and capitalists and relied on its cadres for finances.

( With inputs from IANS )