LUCKNOW : Voices of dissent emanate from various quarters in Uttar Pradesh, especially in some pockets where the BJP has repeated the sitting MPs, besides the one where Saket Mishra has been introduced for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
The BJP has announced its first list of 195 candidates, of which 51 are meant for UP. Of these, while the party reposed faith in 44 sitting MPs, it has given tickets to three candidates in Sambhal, Amroha and Lalganj — who had lost the election in 2019. Three new faces — Saket Mishra from Shravasti, Ritesh Pandey (BSP turncoat) from Ambedkarnagar and Kripa Shankar Singh from Jaunpur — have also been introduced in battleground UP.
However, despite party leadership’s appeal for a united face with a robust campaign to ensure victory, the sulking cadres have been unable to suppress their sentiments against the declared candidate. The dissenting voices emerged in Shravasti, where the BJP has fielded Saket Mishra, MLC and an investment banker. He is the son of retired IAS officer Nripendra Mishra, chairman of the Ram Temple Construction Committee.
The BJP had lost Shravasti in 2019 to the BSP. Recently, some local BJP workers thronged the party office in Shravasti, raising slogans against Mishra. Mishra took out an impressive roadshow, leading a convoy of 200 vehicles in an open four-wheeler, covering three assembly segments.
“Sakateji has been active here for the last five years. His maternal grandfather Badlu Ram Shukla has been an MP from adjoining Bahraich,” says a local leader. In Fatehpur Sikri, the twin constituency of Agra, Rajkumar Chahar, a Jat OBC leader and sitting MP, has been repeated.