Alliance blues: SP, Cong pitted against each other on 6 seats

Lucknow: It’s official now. Samajwadi Party candidates will contest against their Congress counterparts in at least six assembly constituencies going to polls in the third phase on February 19. The contest will occur despite the announcement of a much hyped pre-poll alliance between the two parties in which SP was to contest on 298 seats and the Congress on the remaining 105 seats in 403-strong UP assembly.

Even though Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav jointly launched the grand ‘UP Ko Ye Saath Pasand Hai’ campaign for the alliance in Lucknow last week, and have since been campaigning for the its candidates in West UP, the two parties appear to have been unable to iron out their differences over the alliance’s seat-sharing arrangement.

TOI had reported on Friday that candidates from both SP and Congress had filed their nomination papers in at least eight assembly constituencies despite a formal announcement of candidature by one or the other. After 5pm on February 3, the last date for withdrawal of nomination papers, only two SP and Congress candidates withdrew their candidatures against their alliance partners, setting the stage for a SP versus Congress match on at least six assembly seats.

The most embarrassing situation has cropped in Kanpur, where Rahul and Akhilesh are scheduled to launch the alliance’s Common Minimum Programme on Sunday, February 5, and follow it with a road show and public address.

SP and Congress candidates are pitted against each other in Govindnagar, Arya Nagar, Kanpur Cantonment and Maharajpur assemblies in Kanpur district. Only one candidate, SP’s Om Prakash Mishra, withdrew his candidature from the Kidwai Nagar seat against Congress MLA Ajay Kapoor. When contacted, SP district president Fazal Mahmood said disciplinary action would be taken against those candidates who have filed their nominations against the party’s diktat. Congress’s district president Harprakash Agnihotri seemed in agreement with Mahmood at least on this. Agnihotri also said Congress would take action against those who flouted the party’s diktat and filed their nominations against SP’s candidates.

In Kanpur’s Govindnagar constituency, SP’s Yogendra Kushwaha has filed his nomination despite Congress declaring Ambuj Shukla as its nominee, while in Arya Nagar, INC’s Pramod Jaiswal has filed his papers even though SP declared Amitabh Bajpai as its candidate. In Kanpur Cantonment, Congress’s Sohil Akhtar Ansari’s candidature has been challenged by SP’s Mohd Hasan Roomi, while Congress’ former Akbarpur MP Rajaram Pal is pitted against SP’s Aruna Tomar from Maharajpur.

Crisis is also brewing in the Lucknow Central constituency and Zaidpur in Barabanki, where Congress candidates Abdul Maroof Khan and Tanuj Punia respectively filed nominations against SP candidates Ravidas Mehrotra and Ram Gopal, respectively. Congress’s Naresh Balmiki, however, withdrew his nomination against SP’s Ambarish Singh Pushkar from Mohanlalganj.

In Barabanki’s Zaidpur constituency, Rajya Sabha MP PL Punia’s son Tanuj filed his nomination even though he wasn’t named as a Congress nominee. SP has already fielded Ram Gopal from the seat.