LUCKNOW: Bahujan Samaj Party finally released its first list of 16 candidates in Uttar Pradesh for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls on Sunday. The party is, apparently, set to upset the apple cart of opposition bloc in Muslim dominated segments as seven of the 16 candidates announced for the seats of western UP are Muslims.
Of the 16 candidates, the fate of eight will be decided in the first phase on April 19, five in the second phase on April 26, two in the third phase on May 7 and one (Shahjahanpur- SC) in the fourth phase on May 13.
The BSP, which is going alone in this Lok Sabah elections unlike 2019 when it was in grand alliance with Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party, has replaced Fazlur Rehman, the sitting BSP MP from Saharanpur, with Majid Ali owing to the strong anti-incumbency sentiment against the sitting MP.
Shripal Singh has been chosen to represent the party in Kairana. In 2019, BSP had not fielded the candidate on Kairana seat which had gone to the SP in alliance. Similarly, BSP had not contested Muzaffarnagar in 2019 as per the alliance seat arrangement. This time it has given ticket to Dara Singh Prajapati from Muzaffarnagar to take on SP’s Harendra Mallik who is a former MLA and BJP’s sitting MP Sanjeev Balyan, a minister in Modi cabinet.
The party has fielded Vijendra Singh from Bijnor, Surendra Pal Singh from Nagina (SC) shifting Girish Chandra Jatav, the sitting BSP MP from Nagina to Bualndshahr, another reserved seat. Mohammad Irfan Saifi has been fielded from Moradabad, which has around 47 per cent Muslim population leading to the division of minority votes denting the prospects of SP candidate under INDI Alliance. In 2019, Moradabad seat was won by Dr ST Hassan of SP.
However, Akhilesh Yadav is yet to finalise the candidate for Moradabad.
In Rampur, another Muslim dominated constituency, BSP has decided to go with Zeeshan Khan who would again dent the chances of INDI Alliance candidate who would be finalised by SP in consultation with jailed SP leader Azam Khan as Rampur is considered to be his den. In 2019, Azam Khan had won the seat for SP but vacated it in 2022 as he was fielded by the party in Assembly polls from the same segment.
In the bypoll in 2022, BJP’s Ghanshyam Lodhi wrested the seat from SP. In Sambhal also, where SP had late Shafiqur Rehman Barq as its sitting MP and now his grandson Ziyaur Rehman is the SP candidate, BSP has fielded a Muslim-- Shaulat Ali. Mujahid Hussain has been given the ticket from Amroha by Mayawati to challenge the might of Danish Ali who is now contesting on a Congress ticket from the same seat after representing it in Lok Sabha for the previous term as a BSP MP. Mayawati has shown confidence in Devvratt Tyagi from Meerut.
The party has nominated Praveen Bansal to contest from Baghpat, Rajendra Singh Solanki from Gautam Buddh Nagar, Abid Ali from Aonla, Anis Ahmad Khan from Pilibhit, and Dodaram Verma from Shahjahanpur (SC). In January this year, the BSP supremo had said that the party won't join any alliance and will contest the polls on its own. Earlier this month, the BSP chief had made it clear that she would keep an equal distance from INDI Alliance and the ruling NDA while dismissing the speculations of joining I.N.D.I.A bloc members, Congress and Samajwadi Party. However, she has been consistently denying the speculations surrounding the alliance.
Later on Sunday evening, the BSP released another list of nine candidates for Hathras, Mathura, Agra (SC), Fatehpur Sikri, Firozabad, Etawah (SC), Kanpur, Akbarpur (Kanpur Dehat), and Jalaun.
Of the nine seats while three including Mathura, Agra(SC) and Fatehpur Sikri of Braj region which will go to polls in second and third phase on April 26 and May 7 respectively. Two seats – Firozabad and Etawah belong to the Yadav land and will go to polls respectively in third and fourth phase on May 7 and May 13.
Similarly, while Kanpur and Akbarpur will see voting in fourth phase on May 13, Jalaun will vote in fifth phase on May 20.
Incidentally, unlike the first list of 16 candidates, the second list of nine does not have even a single Muslim candidate.