Centre according step-motherly treatment to Kerala: BSP

Lucknow, Aug 28: BSP supremo Mayawati today accused the Centre of according "step-motherly treatment" to Kerala and demanded that all-out help be provided to the flood-hit state.

The party also urged the Centre to declare the floods in the southern state as a national calamity.

"Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) condemns the step-motherly treatment shown towards non-BJP ruled Kerala, which has been badly affected by the floods. We demand that it be declared a national calamity," Mayawati said in a party release issued here.

"The entire Kerala and part of Karnataka have been hit by floods and different organisations and individuals are doing the needful at their level, but the central government has not shown the required seriousness and sensitivity towards it," she said.

Neither has the Centre declared it a national calamity nor shown any seriousness in giving permission to Kerala to impose cess on state Goods and Services Tax (GST) to generate resources on its own, the BSP president said, asking whether this was not an example of Bhartiya Janata Party's (BJP) "narrow politics".

Mayawati also asked her partymen in various states under the south zone to provide all possible help to the needy, adding that all state governments, shunning their political affiliations, should lend support.

She said some areas in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand have also been hit by floods.

Over 300 people have died and lakhs displaced in the floods and landslides caused by the monsoon rains since August 8 across Kerala.

PTI