Polling for 11 seats in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council will be held on October 23, with campaigning set to conclude on Wednesday evening. With the elections taking place ahead of the 2027 Assembly polls, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP) have intensified their campaigns, turning the contest into a prestige battle for both parties.
Of the 11 seats, the Lucknow Graduate constituency will witness a contest between BJP candidate Avanish Kumar Singh and SP nominee Kanti Singh. In the Agra Graduate constituency, BJP’s Dr Manvendra Pratap Singh is pitted against the SP’s Akash Agarwal.
In the Meerut-Saharanpur Graduate constituency, BJP candidate Dinesh Goyal will face SP nominee Pramendra Bhati. SP chief Akhilesh Yadav has personally appealed to voters to support Kanti Singh in the MLC elections.
In the Varanasi-Mirzapur Graduate constituency, the contest is between BJP’s Kedarnath Singh and SP candidate Ashutosh Sinha. Meanwhile, BJP’s Ashok Kumar Rathore will take on the SP’s Dr Man Singh Yadav in the Allahabad-Jhansi constituency.
Close Contest In Teachers’ MLC Seats
The BJP and the SP have also stepped up their campaigns for the teachers’ constituencies.
In Lucknow, BJP candidate Umesh Dwivedi is contesting against the SP’s Sushil Kumar Patel. In Meerut-Ghaziabad, the BJP has fielded Shrichand Sharma, while the SP candidate is Nitin Kumar Tomar.
In the Bareilly-Moradabad constituency, the BJP’s Dr Hari Singh Dhillon is facing the SP’s Haji Mohammad Danish Akhtar. In Varanasi, BJP candidate Dr Pramod Mishra is contesting against SP nominee Lal Bihari Yadav.
In Agra-Aligarh, the BJP has fielded Hari Kishore Tiwari against the SP’s Dr Prakash Chandra Gupta. The Gorakhpur-Faizabad constituency will see BJP candidate Dhruv Tripathi face Dr Sanjay Kumar Tripathi, who is contesting on an SP ticket after rebelling against the BJP.
Rebel Candidates Pose Challenge For BJP
Rebel candidates have emerged as a major challenge for the BJP in the MLC elections, with discontent over ticket distribution threatening to affect the party’s prospects in several constituencies.
Dr Sanjay Kumar Tripathi, who is contesting against the BJP in Gorakhpur-Faizabad, joined the SP after being denied a BJP ticket. Several other leaders who were unhappy with the party’s candidate selection have also announced their rebellion.
Two days ago, MLC Devendra Pratap Singh from Faizabad issued a letter appealing to voters to help him avenge what he described as his humiliation. The developments have added another layer of complexity to the BJP’s electoral battle ahead of the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: abplive.com
