No reservation in shaking hands with anti-BJP parties over EVM issue: Mayawati

Lucknow: BSP supremo Mayawati today said she has no reservations in shaking hands with other parties in her struggle against the BJP on the issue of EVM tampering in the recent Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. "The BSP now has no reservations in taking the help of anti-BJP parties in its fight against EVM tampering and the BJP as it is the democracy which comes first...we have to keep democracy alive," she said while addressing an Ambedkar anniversary function of the party here. Addressing the first programme of the BSP after a dismal show in the recent Assembly elections, Mayawati, in a major announcement, also appointed her brother Anand Kumar as party's vice president. "I announce my brother Anand Kumar as the party's national vice president with the condition that he will never become MP, MLA, minister of chief minister," she said. Speaking for the first time before her party workers on her medical condition which she said has forced her to read written texts, she said she lost one of her glands in 1996. "One of the two glands in my throat was removed by doctors in an operation and so I cannot stress my throat too much," Mayawati said. The BSP chief who has been under fire following a recent decision of the Yogi Adityanath government to order probe into sale of sugar mills and construction of memorials under her government, she said, "I'm being targetted under a conspiracy so that I stop speaking on the EVM issue tampering by BJP." "It is being shown as if I'm responsible whereas I have never held either of the departments....the sugar department was headed by Naseemuddin... all decisions were taken by the cabinet", she said. Adityanath has ordered an inquiry into the Mayawati-led BSP government's decision to sell 21 state sugar mills for a song in 2010-2011. "A thorough inquiry should be conducted into the Rs 1,100 crore scam. If necessary, the state government would also recommend a CBI inquiry into the issue," the chief minister had said when presentations about sugarcane development department were made before him last week.