All eyes on tussle for UP’s last Rajya Sabha seat
LUCKNOW: THE GOVERNMENT IS NINE SHORT OF THE VOTES IT NEEDS TO GET A NINTH CANDIDATE ELECTED TO THE UPPER HOUSE OF PARLIAMENT
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is assured of winning at least eight out of the 10 Rajya Sabha seats up for grabs and the Samajwadi Party (SP) one in Friday’s elections to the upper House from Uttar Pradesh, portending a cliffhanger of a contest for the sole remaining seat .
A victory for the BJP’s ninth candidate in the fray would mean defeat for joint opposition candidate Bhimrao Ambedkar of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). This is the contest all political observers in Uttar Pradesh will be watching.
Eight BJP candidates, each of whom requires 37 votes, would easily sail through on their party’s strength. So would SP’s Jaya Bachchan, whose party has 47 votes.
The SP would be left with only 10 votes to spare for Ambedkar after voting for Bachchan.
BJP (311) and its allies Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (4) and Apna Dal (9) have a total of 324 votes, 296 of which will be needed to get eight candidates elected to the upper House, leaving only 28 surplus votes for the ruling party in Uttar Pradesh, nine short of the required number for its ninth candidate .
A win over Ambedkar would exact revenge for the BJP, which lost the crucial Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha seats to the SP this month in by-elections in which the latter had the backing of the BSP.
In hectic lobbying preceding Friday’s elections, two additional state legislators – SP’s Nitin Agrawal and independent Amanmani Tripathi – attended a meeting over dinner hosted by chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday, likely meaning they would vote for the ruling party’s ninth candidate, Anil Agarwal.
BJP strategists admit that the presence of independent legislator Raghuraj Pratap Singh, better known as Raja Bhaiya, and SP president Akhilesh Yadav’s estranged uncle and party member of the legislative assembly (MLA) Shivpal Yadav at the SP’s dinner for lawmakers indicates that the opposition is in no mood to give up the fight.
“Shivpal Yadav, who turned up for the SP dinner, also met Nishad Party MLA Vijay Mishra. After initially showing signs of supporting the BJP, Mishra didn’t turn up for the dinner hosted by the CM, which spices up the contest further,” said Irshad Ilmi, editor of Kanpurbased Urdu daily ‘Siyasat’.
The likely support of Amanmani Tripathi and Nitin Agrawal would be an advantage for the BJP, but suspense persists over the remaining seven votes the party would require to defeat the joint opposition candidate.