Amid the ongoing talks over seat sharing among the INDIA bloc partners, the Samajwadi Party chief and former Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday announced that a pact was reached between his party and Congress which would contest on 11 of 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh in upcoming Lok Sabha eletions.
Last week, the SP made the announcement of sparing seven seats for Jayant Chaudhury-led Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD). Thus if the Congress agrees to the SP's offer, Akhilesh Yadav's party will be left with 62 of 80 seats to contest in LS polls.
Taking to microblogging social media site X (former twitter), Akhilesh Yadav said his party’s alliance with the Congress was “off to a good start” with 11 “strong” Lok Sabha seats in the state.
Akhilesh’s statement has come at a time when the buzz around Bihar CM and Janata Dal (United) president Nitish Kumar possible return to the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA, toppling the Mahagathbandhan government is gaining strength.
"Our cordial alliance with the Congress is off to a good start with 11 strong seats. This trend will move forward with the winning equation. ‘INDIA’ team and ‘PDA’ strategy will change history,” Yadav said on social media platform X.
80 members of the Lower House of the Parliament come from UP. General elections are expected to take place in April-May this year.
However, UP Congress leadership chose to remain non-commital over SP chief's claim saying the final decision rested with party's high command.
"The talks towards seat sharing have been going on in a very congenial and positive atmosphere towards a certain and strong result. However, with reference to Akhileshji's X post, let me make it clear that any decision on seat sharing will be taken by our central election committee, headed by Mukul Wasnik, " said UP Congress Committee chief Ajai Rai.
Significantly, the BJP swept the national polls in Uttar Pradesh for a second time by winning 62 seats in the state despite a formidable SP-BSP-RLD mahagathbandhan in 2019.
UP remains crucial to both the BJP’s hope of retaining power and the Opposition bloc's attempt to prevent that.
The BJP strengthened its position in the state by becoming the first party to return to power in Uttar Pradesh in 37 years. It won 255 in a 403-member House while SP managed to get 111 seats, and Congress two.
It may be recalled that on January 17, SP and Congress had met over seat sharing in New Delhi. However, with no respectable headway, senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid had claimed that one more round of talks with SP was due in Lucknow.
He had added that if the talks would not fetch positive result, Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge or party MP Rahul Gandhi would talk to Akhilesh.
Invite latest round of talks, Congress was represented by Salman Khurshid, UPCC chief Ajai Rai and party MLA Aradhana Mishra. SP was represented by national general secretary and RS member Prof Ram Gopal Yadav, SP MLC Javed Ali and ex-MLC Udaiveer Singh.
As per sources, during the initial three rounds of talks, Congress had been seeking 25 seats, including Lucknow, or at least those 21 seats which it had won in 2009.
Currently, Congress has just one seat of Rae Bareli in UP while SP has three of Moradabad, Sambhal and Mainpuri.
The sources claimed that the seats which the Congress may contest include it's bastion Ae Bareli, it's lost stronghold of Amethi, Pratapgarh, Varanasi, Kanpur, Ghaziabad, Prayagraj, Saharanpur and Moradabad. Most of the eastern UP seats may remain with SP.
The two parties allied for the 2017 assembly elections but their leaders campaigned separately. The alliance remained merely on the paper as the BJP stormed back to power, Congress had won7 seats and SP 47.
However, the Congress has little bargaining power. It got just 2.33% votes in the 2022 assembly polls while the SP polled 32.06% and Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) 2.85%.
Congress, SP, and RLD collectively managed just 38% vote share in the 2019 polls against BJP’s 50%.
In 2019, while Congress had contested independently on 67 winning just Rae Bareli. SP had contested on 37 and could win just five seats of which two -- Rampur and Azamgarh -- were lost in in 2022 bypoll. BSP had contested on 38 and had won 10 seats.
In 2014, Congress had contested on 67 seats winning just two, SP had contested on 75 winning just five and BSP had failed to open its account despite contesting on all 80 seats.
In 2009, Congress and BSP had fielded their candidates on 69 seats each and won 21 and 20 seats respectively. SP had contested on 75 seats and won 23 seats.