The party was founded in 1984 by Kanshi Ram. Due to his deteriorating health in the 1990's, former school teacher Mayawati became the party's de facto leader. The party's power grew quickly with seats in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly and India's Lower House of Parliament. In 1993, following the assembly elections, Mayawati formed a coalition with Samajwadi Party President Mulayam Singh Ya
dav as Chief Minister. In mid-1995, she withdrew support to his government, which led to a major incident where Mulayam Singh Yadav was accused of keeping her party legislator's hostage to try and break her party. Since this, they have regarded each other publicly as chief rivals. Mayawati then sought the support of the BJP to become Chief Minister on June 3rd, 1995. In October 1995 the BJP withdrew support to her and fresh elections were called after President's Rule. After the 1997 elections, no party achieved a majority. The BSP tied up with the BJP again, with an arrangement to rotate the Chief Minister's post every six months. After Mayawati's first rotation, she withdrew support to the BJP shortly into her successor's (Kalyan Singh) term. the BSP legislatie party split and kept a BJP government in power for the next four-and-a-half years. After assembly elections in 2002, the BSP tied up once again with the BJP, but this time, with Mayawati in charge as the Chief Minister throughout. In August 2003, this coalition fell as the BJP withdrew support. In what was viewed as a collaboration between the BJP and SP, the BJP assembly speaker (Lalji Tandon) recognized the split of the BSP legislative party, which allowed Mulayam Singh Yadav to become Chief Minister with rebel support. In the interim, Mayawati began to make intense outreach to other castes, particularly Brahmins, who were traditionally wary of her. Many sitting MLA's from other parties defected to the BSP prior to the 2007 assembly elections.
