Voting for bypolls in two Lok Sabha seats of Gorakhpur and Phulpur recorded low voter turnout of 43% and 38% respectively.
Voting for bypolls in two Lok Sabha seats of Gorakhpur and Phulpur recorded low voter turnout of 43% and 38% respectively. While there were 19.49 lakh eligible voters in Gorakhpur, Phulpur seat in Allahabad district has 19.61 lakh voters.
Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha seats were vacated by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and his Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya respectively. Polling on the two Lok Sabha seats on Sunday was by and large peaceful. Results will be declared on March 14 after counting of EVM votes.
While Mayawati-led BSP had extended support to Samajwadi Party candidates, the battle in both high-profile constituencies became triangular contest after the Congress joined the fray.
Bypoll results on the two Lok Sabha seats will be a referendum on the performance of the Yogi Adityanath government. On the other hand, a success for the SP-BSP experiment could pave the way for the two major players in Uttar Pradesh to tie up in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections to counter the BJP, which had trounced them in the last general and assembly elections.
After 25 years, the SP and BSP came together during by polls and the Congress, which contested bypolls separately, has also hinted to join the opposition against the BJP ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha polls. It has already announced its support to the BSP candidate in Rajya Sabha polls.
After casting his vote in Gorakhpur, Yogi Adityanath said that people would vote BJP for its one year of good governance in the state. The Chief Minister exuded confidence that the BJP will retain both the seats with a comfortable margin.
“People will reject the SP-BSP alliance in the bypolls as it was an opportunistic alliance. BJP is not worried even if the Congress also joins this unholy alliance. People will reject them too,” said Yogi Adityanath.
“People had rejected both Babuas (Akhilesh Yadav and Rahul Gandhi) in 2017 Assemby polls. Mayawati will also face a similar fate in bypolls,” predicted the Chief Minister.
For the BJP, Gorakhpur is significant as it is the bastion of the chief minister, who has represented the seat in the Lok Sabha five times. Prior to Yogi Adityanath, the seat was thrice represented in Parliament by his mentor Yogi Avaidyanath.
There are 10 candidates in the fray from Gorakhpur.
The BJP has fielded Upendra Dutt Shukla against SP's Pravin Nishad. Sureetha Kareem is the Congress candidate from Gorakhpur.
The Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav, who got a shot into arms after BSP, RLD, Left and smaller parties announced support to his party candidates against the BJP on the two Lok Sabha seats said that unprecedented opposition unity on Sunday during bypolls has written a new history in Uttar Pradesh.
“The results of the bypolls will bring a revolution in state politics and will go a long way in changing political equations and future of Uttar Pradesh,” claimed Yadav.
Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya too rejected opposition’s claims He said that the "unholy" SP-BSP alliance will have no impact on the winning spree of the BJP.
“The opposition's tall claims were only to confuse voters. There would be no transfer of BSP votes to Samajwadi Party candidates as the BSP vote-bank has already shifted to the BJP,” claimed Maurya.
Phulpur, once the bastion of the Congress and represented by India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, witnessed a saffron surge in the 2014 Lok Sabha election, when Maurya won the seat.
There are 22 candidates contesting from Phulpur. The BJP has fielded Kaushalendra Singh Patel against SP's Nagendra Pratap Singh Patel. The Congress has fielded Manish Mishra.
Atique Ahmed, who once represented Phulpur in the Lok Sabha, is again contesting as an independent candidate.
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 "Voters display their voters ID card at a polling booth for Phulpur bypoll on Sunday")
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