MSY earns unique distinction of being a star campaigner!
Samjawadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav earned the unique distinction of being a star campaigner of two political parties which have fielded candidates against each other. Besides being the star campaigner of Samajwadi Party, the lok Dal led by Sunil Singh has also named Mulayam as a star campaigner of the party.
lok Dal president Sunil Singh said he has taken permission from Mulayam Singh Yadav to include his name in the star campaigners list. He said Mulayam has even confirmed that he would campaign for lok Dal candidates.
The Samajwadi Party, however, declined to comment on the announcement made by lok Dal chief as the party is a rival of the SP in Assembly elections.
Many dissidents of the SP, including sitting MlAs on being denied tickets by the SP, have found refuge in lok Dal and were rewarded with tickets. The symbol “farmer ploughing field” also matches with the Samajwadi profile of dissidents.
On Friday last, Mulayam announced that he would campaign for select candidates from February 9. He said he would first go to Etawah to campaign for his brother Shivpal Yadav, who is seeking re-election from Jaswant Nagar seat of the district for a record fifth term.
The SP patriarch said he would consider campaigning in other seats later. Mulayam is likely to campaign for senior SP leader Azam Khan seeking re-election from Ramopur and his son Abdullah Azam, who is debuting in electoral politics from Swar Tanda seat of Rampur district.
Cong-SP ‘kich kich’ over poll fight continues
With nascent partners Congress and Samajwadi Party locking horns in over a dozen seats so far with candidates
from both hues filing their nominations, lucknow presents the most curious picture.
The Congress top brass has given symbols to five candidates but has shied away from declaring them as official
candidates so far even even as the last date of withdrawl being over on Friday afternoon.
In western UP too, four candidates were given the
Congress symbol but their names did not figure in the party’s list of candidates.
While nomination of Congress candidate Harshvardan from Mohanlalganj (Reserved) seat was cancelled during scrutiny, another Naresh Valmiki, was forced to withdraw in favour of Samajwadi Party candidate from the same seat.
In lucknow Central segment, Maroof Khan had filed his papers on the direction of Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, even as his name did not figure in the All India Congress Committee list released by general secretary Madhusudan Mistri so far.
Meanwhile, SP’s Ravidas Malhotra too filed his papers from the same seat and both have not withdrawn their names even as the last date expired on Friday.
Interestingly, some UPCC office bearers tried to contact Khan over phone through out Friday, but he did not take any calls ostensibly to remain in the fray. Preetam Srivastava