Only a week is left before the voting for the Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls in UP. Political parties are eyeing the two parliamentary constituencies as the preparation for the 2019 general elections.
The stakes are high, considering in the 2017 UP Assembly elections BJP won 325 seats out of the 403. BJP is looking to retain both the seats. Conversely, the other parties in the state will be looking to put an end to BJP’s victories. The bypolls have been necessitated by the fact that Yogi Adityanath deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya have left the seats of Gorakhpur and Phulpur empty and ready to be filled. For BJP to win the Gorakhpur seat will be a matter of pride, considering that the chief minister represented the seat 5 times in the Lok Sabha.
For Congress Phulpur will be the seat they eye as it was represented by Jawaharlal Nehru. But it was in 2014 that Congress lost the seat to Maurya. But the bypolls are more than a straight BJP versus Congress battle, the Samajwadi Party is the third player looking to steal the seats from under the noses of both parties. In the frontline BJP has chosen its candidates, Kaushalendra Singh Patel for Gorakhpur and Upendra Dutt Shukla for Phulpur. Samajwadi Party has chosen, Pravin Nishad and Nagendra Pratap Singh Patel for Gorakhpur and Phulpur respectively. Congress has chosen Sureetha Kareem for Gorakhpur and Manish Mishra from Phulpur accordingly.
BJP is looking to increase its margin this time around and will be championing development. It was on March 11 last year, in fact, the BJP swept the elections in the state by storm. One thing that will help BJP win is if the opposition vote is divided and that is risky for the two other parties eyeing the seats. Moreover in Phulpur the don Atiq Ahmed has come as a blessing for BJP, who is standing independently and will have a 15% claim on the Muslim vote. The chances for the opposition looks slim and the more fissures, the better for the looming BJP.