Another SP leader from Mau joins BJP

Lucknow: A year after he joined the Samajwadi Party, former MLA from Madhuban in Mau, Umesh Pandey, again switched loyalties and joined the BJP on Thursday. Pandey was inducted in the saffron fold in the presence of UP BJP chief Bhupendra Chaudhary and deputy CM Brajesh Pathak at BJP office in Lucknow. The development is being seen as a nudge to the SP ahead of the upcoming Ghosi bypoll where BJP’s Dara Singh Chauhan is up against SP’s Sudhakar Singh. Without taking any name, Pandey attacked SP chief (Akhilesh Yadav) for favouring a ‘criminal’. “I have served the people of Madhuban and Mau. I had told the SP chief that I will quit if Sudhakar is given a ticket,” he told reporters. Pandey said his brother, Akhilesh Pandey, who was a block pramukh, was murdered during the time of Mulayam Singh Yadav’s government in 2005. “We will help in the development of the country under the leadership of PM Narendra Modi and CM Yogi Adityanath,” he said, adding that he would campaign for the party in Ghosi.Pandey’s induction is being seen as BJP’s bid to consolidate upper caste votes in Ghosi. Chauhan had faced a protest in Ghosi when a person threw ink on him earlier this week. Chauhan, too, had quit as SP MLA from Ghosi in Mau recently and joined the BJP. Pandey was elected the MLA from Madhuban seat in Mau on a BSP ticket in 2012. But in the 2017 UP elections, he lost the seat to Dara Singh Chauhan who had then switched to BJP from BSP. Pandey subsequently joined the SP and contested from Madhuban seat in the 2022 elections but lost to Ram Bilash Chauhan. Pathak said people of Ghosi know that anarchy and hooliganism are in the DNA of SP. “SP has proved this by giving the ticket to a criminal. This shows the mentality of SP. This is the reason why the people of the state have pushed it to the fringes,” he added.