Rampur, Farrukhabad, Pratapgarh and Gonda Lok Sabha seats are said to have emerged as the bone of contention between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party in their seat-sharing talks.
NEW DELHI: Rampur, Farrukhabad, Pratapgarh and Gonda Lok Sabha seats are said to have emerged as the bone of contention between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party in their seat-sharing talks.
During the next round of talks on September 8, Congress and SP leaders are likely to try and thrash out differences over the Lok Sabha seats.
After the latest delimitation exercise, both Congress and Samajwadi Party are keen on certain seats and give up some others on which they are not not confident. In the process, differences appeared to have cropped up on certain seats, including Rampur, Gonda, Farrukhabad and Pratapgarh.
One of the Congress vice-presidents in the state said that SP wants its star-turned-politician Jaya Prada to contest from the Lucknow seat.
"They want to leave the Rampur seat for Congress veteran Begum Noor Bano. But the Begum herself wants to contest from Moradabad after the delimitation has shifted certain assembly segments out of Rampur," he claimed.
In Moradabad, SP wants to continue with its sitting MP. Similar is the case with Pratapgarh, where Congress wants to once again try its luck with Ratna Singh who contested against Akshay Pratap Singh, the sibling of controversial UP politician Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiyya. Ratna Singh is the daughter of Congress veteran Dinesh Singh. The SP, of course is not ready to vacate its seat.
Brijbhushan Singh had won the Gonda seat from a BJP ticket but had later joined the SP.
Rebel SP MP Beni Prasad Verma, who had contested last year's assembly elections as a Samajwadi Kranti Party candidate with Congress backing from Ayodhya, has already announced his plans to contest from Gonda on a Congress ticket.
"I will join Congress as soon as elections are announced. I have requested Soniaji to field me from Gonda," Verma had said recently.
Congress General Secretary in charge of UP affairs Digvijay Singh sought to downplay the issue and said the seats of Farrukhabad and Pratapgarh were yet to come for discussions.
When asked about possible desertions in Congress following alliance with SP, he said desertions were common in all political parties in UP.
Refusing to go into the dynamics of seat sharing and who will contest from where, the party in-charge of UP said winnability and image of the candidate was the only criteria for the candidates.
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