LUCKNOW: While the BJP's allies are building up pressure on the ruling party for seat sharing arrangements for the upcoming bypolls to 10 assembly seats, the BJP doesn’t seem to be in a mood to spare much except a seat or two for ally Jayant Chaudhury-led Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD).
After its poor showing in the recent Lok Sabha elections, the ruling BJP is looking at making up for lost prestige by winning the battle of perception ahead of the 2027 Assembly polls.
As per BJP insiders, the party may spare the Meerapur seat in Muzaffarnagar for the RLD. The Meerapur seat was with the RLD prior to the Lok Sabha polls and its sitting MLA Chandan Chauhan vacated it after getting elected to the Lok Sabha from Bijnor. The RLD and BJP had contested the Lok Sabha elections in alliance.
“In the remaining nine seats, the party may field its own candidates without taking any risk by sparing them to allies,” says a senior BJP leader.
Notably, to win maximum seats in the upcoming bypolls, both the party organisation and the state government are working in tandem keeping in mind the caste equations of each and every seat. Of the 10 seats up for grabs, the BJP had three, its ally NISHAD party had one, five were held by the Samajwadi Party (SP) and one was with the RLD which it had contested and won in 2022 in alliance with the SP.
Moreover, of the 10, the BJP had contested eight in the 2022 state polls and won just three with a strike rate of 37.8 per cent, while its ally NISHAD had contested on two winning one with a strike rate of 50 per cent. The SP had contested nine and won five with a strike rate of 55.55 per cent while the RLD had a cent per cent strike rate as it had contested on one seat and won it.
Significantly, in the recent Lok Sabha elections, BJP allies including OP Rajbhar’s Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP), Sanjay Nishad’s NISHAD party and Anupriya Patel's Apna Dal (S) fared poorly.
While Rajbhar ensured his son’s victory from Ghosi, Sanjay Nishad’s son Praveen Nishad, who was contesting on the BJP symbol, lost the seat. Anupriya Patel’s Apna Dal (S) lost the Robertsganj seat and even Anupriya won in a see-saw battle failing to get her core Kurmi vote on the expected lines.
As a result, the ruling BJP has decided to go mostly on its own in the bypolls. However, political experts believe that the BJP may either spare Meerapur or Khair or even both for the RLD as both the seats have a respectable chunk of Jat voters and the ruling party got a good support of that chunk in the Lok Sabha polls due to its alliance with the RLD.
Interestingly, UP CM Yogi Adityanath is leading the bypoll battle from the front leaving nothing to chance. He has taken up the onus of the two most difficult seats of Milkipur in Ayodhya and Katehari in Ambedkarnagar. In both seats which were won by the SP in 2022, the caste arithmetic is against the ruling party.
Deputy CM Keshav Maurya is shouldering the responsibility of Phulpur and Majhawan, both won by the BJP in 2022. However, the other deputy CM Brajesh Pathak is sailing in difficult waters as he has been given the charge of Karhal, the traditional stronghold of SP chief Akhilesh Yadav and Sisamau in Kanpur which was also won by the SP.
BJP state chief Bhupendra Chaudhury is looking after the preparations in Meerapur and Kundarki in Moradabad where he hails from. The party’s UP (organisation) general secretary Dharampal Singh has been given the easiest set of two – Ghaziabad and Khair.