Lucknow. National President of the Republican Party of India (Athawale) and Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment Ramdas Athawale has responded to the statement of RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav. 

Athawale said that our government is very strong. NDA has 292 MPs and many of the 17 independent MPs are in touch with us. In such a situation, the government is very strong and it will last for the full five years. 

Ramdas Athawale took a dig at Rahul Gandhi that he should not dream of becoming the Prime Minister in the next 20 to 30 years. Athawale said that the NDA alliance in UP was expecting to get 71 seats, but got very less. Here SP and Congress were successful in spreading the illusion among the people that the Constitution will be changed if they get more than 400 seats.

Our party should join the NDA

Athawale said that if our party is also included in the NDA in UP like other small parties, it will benefit a lot. Assembly elections are to be held in Maharashtra in October but now the opposition parties will not be able to spread the fear of changing the constitution there. 

He said that now the politics of development will prevail. We will demand from BJP to contest on 8 to 10 seats in Maharashtra. On the question of Anupriya Patel raising the issue of reservation irregularities in the recruitment of 69 thousand teachers, he said that the state government should take action as per the rules.