The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
In, out, in, SP’S final Moradabad nominee says: ‘No one can force party leadership’
THERE IS no end to the troubles for the Samajwadi Party (SP) in Moradabad. Ever since the Lok Sabha ticket allocation for the seat on March 27, when the party controversially denied the nomination to its sitting MP S T Hasan and gave it to former party MLA Ruchi Veera at the last moment, the two leaders have squared off, putting the party’s campaign in jeopardy.
After Veera's nomination papers were accepted, a letter purportedly written by SP president Akhilesh Yadav surfaced saying Hasan was the party's official candidate, adding to the confusion.
Left in the end without a ticket, Hasan told The Indian Express that he wouldn’t campaign for Veera — who is considered to be a confidant of senior jailed SP leader Azam Khan — even though Akhilesh had asked him to do so. “The candidatedoes not need the support of local leaders. She said this. Elections are not contested with arrogance. Our (SP’S) election is not going well,” he said.
Asked if Azam Khan had a role to play in denying him theticket, Hasan said, “I am not sure whether he is upset or happy. I tried to meet him twice or thrice but could not. But I believe that Azam Khan sahab does not want anything bad for me. He got me the ticket in 2019. That was a favour he did. What was the pressure on Akhilesh ji? Why did he give tickets to her and later issue a letter to cancel her ticket? Akhilesh ji and his entire family wanted only me to contest.”
Veera, meanwhile, said she was not affected by the controversy. “I would like to say that an election ticket can’t be forced on a party’s national leadership. Whatever happened is now in the past. I have been campaigning for the last few days, and I have seen that people from all communities have accepted me,” said Veera.
On Hasan refusing to campaign for her, she said, “He should campaign for me because he is still in the party. I tried to reach out but whoever picks up the phone doesn’t let me talk to him.”
Veera (62) is from Bijnor and won an Assembly bypoll from there in 2014, defeating the BJP’S Hemendra Pal by 11,000 votes. Her father-in-law Kunwar Satya Veera is a three-time MLA from Bijnor. Her husband Udayan Veera has won a couple of urban local body elections and has been the Zilla Parishad chairman of Bijnor. Udayan’s family runs several schools and colleges in Bijnor.
In 2015, Ruchi was removed from the SP over allegations of anti-party activities. She again contested from Bijnor on an SP ticket in 2017 state polls but lost to thebjp.S he was in the fray to contest the Bijnor Lo kS ab has eat in 2019, but the seat went to the BSP as part of a seat-sharing deal. She then joined the BSP, which gave her the ticket for Bareilly, which she lost to the BJP’S Dharmendra Kumar by 1.13 lakh votes.
Moradabad is one of the Lok Sabha seats in UP that have a Muslim majority. Among the Hindus, who are the minority, Thakurs are the largest group, followed by OBCS and Dalits.