LUCKNOW: With a strong narrative built around the issues ranging from farmers, caste and communal polarization, and Covid, the stage is now set for the battle for UP with 58 assembly constituencies spread across 11 districts in the western region ready to vote on Thursday.
While the campaign for the first phase of the 7-phased state assembly election ended on Tuesday evening, the polling will start at 7 am in consonance with the guidelines spelt out by the Election Commission to ensure Covid-free polls. The voting will end at 6 pm.
The fate of eight ministers of Yogi government -- Shrikant Sharma from Mathura, Chaudhury Lakshmi Narain from Chhatta, Suresh Rana from Thanabhawan, Sandeep Singh from Atrauli, Kapil Dev Agarwal from Muzaffarnagar Sadar, Atul Garg from Ghaziabad Urban, Dr GS Dharmesh from Agra Cantt and Anil Sharma from Shikarpur -- will be at stake in Phase –I.
The districts going to polls on Thursday fall in the Jat belt. They are Shamli, Hapur, Gautam Buddh Nagar, Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Bulandshahr, Aligarh, Mathura and Agra. In these districts, while Muslims make a respectable chunk of 6-40 per cent of the population, Dalits constitute 17-28 per cent, Brahmins 8-10 per cent, and nearly 30 per cent of the population of these districts is dominated by OBCs, particularly the Jats. Other castes such as Kashyaps, Sainis Gurjars are also found in small chunks.
With scores of Covid-driven restrictions on physical rallies, road shows, street gatherings in place, the BJP top brass took to streets to seek votes for the party candidates in door-to-door contact programmes. The saffron party kept their discourse focused around the issues of law and order, exodus, Muzaffarnagar riots, deliverance of the benefit of welfare schemes by the double engine government and infrastructural development under the Yogi government. BJP’s campaign in western UP was led by Union Home Minister Amit Shah himself. PM Modi also addressed 3-4 virtual rallies and UP CM Yogi Adityanath spearheaded the party’s campaign in western UP.
Similarly, SP president Akhilesh Yadav along with alliance partner RLD chief Jayant Chaudhury made a high pitch for a change of guards by BJP’s ouster in the current elections. They reiterated their claim that the people had made up their minds for a change. They basically focused on the farmers' issues and highlighted the long-drawn farmers' unrest over the three farm laws. Meanwhile, BSP chief Mayawati, who started the campaign late, reminded people of her past regime's track record on law and order. The Congress under the leadership of its general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was seen during the party's door-to-door campaigns.
As many as 623 candidates are in the fray in the first phase which has around 2.27 crore electorate in this phase. In 2017, the BJP had registered an impressive win by bagging 53 of 58 seats, while the Samajwadi Party and the BSP had got two seats each. One seat had gone to the Rashtriya Lok Dal.
The interesting battles on the cards in the first phase include Kairana (Constituency of Nahid Hassan, sitting SP MLA), Thana Bhawan (Constituency of Suresh Rana, sitting BJP MLA), Sardhana (Constituency of Sangeet Som, sitting BJP MLA), Chhaprauli (Constituency of Sohendra Singh Ramal, sitting RLD MLA switched sides to BJP), Charthawal (Constituency of Vijay Kashyap, who died in 2021) Agra Rural (Constituency of Baby Rani Maurya) , Loni (Constituency of Nand Kishore Gurjar), Mathura (Constituency of sitting BJP MLA Shrikant Sharma), Chhatta (Constituency of Chaudhury Laksmi Narain, sitting BJP MLA), Noida (constituency of Pankaj Singh, sitting BJP MLA) and Bah (Constituency of Pakshalika Singh, sitting BJP MLA).