Uttar Pradesh Elections 2022: Key candidates, important seats, and all you need to know before counting of votes

Uttar Pradesh police has ramped up the police presence and actions will be taken against those disturbing peace on the day of results, said Additional Director General of Police (law and order) on Wednesday.

"For March 10, we have deployed about 70,000 civil police workers, 245 company - paramilitary forces and 69 company PSE commanders. We have ensured peaceful voting, we will ensure peaceful counting also, said Prashant Kumar, UP ADG (Law and Order).

Also, the state Excise Department has prohibited the sale and operation of liquor in the entire state on the day of the result.

"In view of vote counting of UP Election 2022 on March 10, sale and operations of liquor prohibited in the state for the entire day, tomorrow. Action to be taken in case of violation," reads the Excise Department order.

Let us take a look at key candidates and important seats before counting of votes:

1. Sirathu (Kaushambi)

Keshav Dev Maurya ----- BJP

Pallavi Patel -------- SP Ally Apna Dal

Dy CM in UP government Keshav Prasad Maurya is locked in a tough battle. He had won from this assembly seat in 2012 but vacated it after becoming MP in 2014. Apna Dal candidate Pallavi Patel has given him sleepless nights with support of majority Kurmi, Muslim and Yadav votes.

2. Sardhana (Meerut)

Sangeet Som -----BJP

Atul Pradhan ----- SP

Once an accused in the infamous Muzaffarnagar riot case, Sangeet Som has won this seat in 2012 and 2017 assembly polls. This time SP’s Atul Pradhan is posing a challenge with the support of majority Jat, Muslim and Gujjar votes in his favour.

3. Sarojninagar (Lucknow)

Rajeshwar Singh ----- BJP

Abhishek Mishra ----- SP

On this seat the former joint director of Enforcement Directorate (ED), Rajeshwar Singh is being challenged by SP’s former IIM Professor candidate Abhishek Mishra. BJP’s Rajeshwar had taken VRS from ED a week before nomination to enter the fray. This seat has an equal number of Brahmin and Thakur votes.

4. Kunda (Pratapgarh)

Raghuraj Pratap Raja Bhaiyya ----- Jansatta Dal

Gulshan Yadav --------- SP

Raja Bhaiyya has been winning this seat since 1993 and making records every time. During BJP wave in 2017 too he had won with a margin of over one lakh votes. This time SP has fielded Gulshan Yadav as its candidate who was earlier left hand of Raja Bhaiyya. Both candidates are known as muscleman in the area and there has been clashes during the campaign between the two.

5. Thana Bhawan (Shamli)

Suresh Rana ---- BJP

Ashraf Ali ---- RLD

Suresh Rana has been a cabinet minister in Yogi government and remained very close to chief minister. He has won from this seats in 2012 and 2017 assembly polls. This time the pending cane arrear, farm unrest and annoyance of Jat community has posed threat before him. Rana too had been an accused in Muzaffarnagar riots case.

TURNCOATS TO WATCH OUT FOR

1. Swami Prasad Maurya, Fazilnagar (Kusinagar)

Once a top leader in state Bahujan Samaj Party, Swami Prasad Maurya had left it to join BJP in 2016. He was made cabinet minister in Yogi government after wining from the Padrauna assembly seat. However, soon after the announcement of 2022 assembly polls, Maurya switched loyalties to SP. Sensing trouble, Maurya even changed his constituency from Padrauna to Fazilnagar

2. Aditi Singh, Raibareili City

Once close to Gandhi family, Aditi Singh had won 2017 assembly election on Congress ticket. However, her relations with Congress turned soar over organizational matters in Raibareli district. Congress president Sonia Gandhi is MP from Raibareili. Later on Aditi Singh joined BJP just before this election and became its candidate. She is being challenged by SP’s RP Yadav.

3. Dara Singh Chauhan, Ghosi (Mau)

Another cabinet minister who had resigned from government as well as BJP, Dara Singh Chauhan was with BSP till 2016. He too had joined BJP with Swami Prasad Maurya in 2016. In 2017 assembly elections, he contested from Madhuban assembly seat in Mau district and won. He was made minister in Yogi cabinet. However, like Maurya, he too has changed his seat from Madhuban to Ghois this time.

4. Dharam Singh Saini, Nakur (Saharanpur)

A well-known OBC face in Yogi cabinet too had resigned from government as well as BJP just before elections. Like Maurya and Dara Singh, Saini too had been in BSP earlier. He had been a cabinet minister in previous government of Mayawati.

5. Dr Sanjay Singh, Amethi

His relations with Congress has been hot and cold. Once a close confidant of late Sanjay Gandhi, Dr Sanjay Singh had become close to Rajiv Gandhi and later on with Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. For a brief period, he was with Janta Dal and BJP earlier. Before joing BJP in January this year, Dr Sanjay Singh was with Congress.

SEATS THAT MATTER

Zahoorabad: Two main allies of Samajwadi Party in this election are RLD (in the west) and SBSP in the east. SBSP chief contested the previous election as a BJP ally but this time he is in alliance with the main opposition Samajwadi Party.

He is pitted against BJP’s Kalicharan Rajbhar who won the seat in 2002 and 2007 on BSP ticket and BSP’s Sayeda Shadab Fatima who was a minister in the Akhilesh Yadav-led SP government. It won’t be wrong to call it a battle of turncoats.

Om Prakash Rajbhar polled 86,583 votes defeating his closest rival Kalicharan (BSP) by a margin of over 18000 votes but then he was in alliance with BJP. SP stood third then.

Gorakhpur Urban: Gorakhpur Urban surely became the hottest seat this election when BJP announced the sitting chief minister as the candidate from this seat. Samajwadi Party, in an attempt to woo Brahmin voters, had fielded Sabhavati Shukla (wife of late Upendra Shukla who contested the Lok Sabha bypoll on BJP ticket in 2018 — the only time that BJP lost this seat since 1989).

SP is also targeting some sympathy votes in the name of Upendra Shukla. Azad Samaj Party’s founder Chandrashekhar Azad Raavan is also contesting for this seat. g BSP, interestingly, has fielded a Muslim candidate Khwaja Shamsuddin against Yogi Adityanath, which is also being seen as an attempt to further polarise the seat and to make it even easier for Yogi as well as the BJP. Since 1989, BJP hasn’t lost this seat except for 2002.

Karhal: Even when SP’s tally reduced to 47 in 2017, Karhal was one of those few seats where the party (Samajwadi Party) won with a big margin of 38,405 votes. Congress and BJP each could taste victory in this seat just once. The seat has remained with the Samajwadi Party for three consecutive terms.

The seat has a sizeable Yadav voters roughly 1.25 lakhs. BJP has fielded union minister SP Singh Baghel to woo 30,000 Baghel voters on the seat apart from Shakya and Kshatriyas who are considerable in numbers and BJP often considers them as its core vote bank.

It would be interesting to see how this constituency, voting for the first time for a chief ministerial candidate, would choose to vote.

Jaswantnagar: SP stronghold, which elected Mulayam Singh Yadav from 1985 to 1993 for four consecutive terms (a total of 7 terms from this seat) and his younger brother Shivpal Yadav from 1996 to 2017 for 5 consecutive terms would again see its 5-term MLA Shivpal Yadav contesting on the symbol of his old party — Samajwadi Party.

BJP’s Vivek Shakya challenging Shivpal Yadav on his traditional seat. Vivek Shakya’s father Manoj Shakya is a wellknown social worker in Jaswantnagar. Though experts believe it would be a huge challenge for him to outseat Shivpal Yadav here.

Kidwai Nagar: The delimitation exercise before 2012 elections led to the formation of Kidwai Nagar assembly segment. The most high profile seat in Kanpur-Kidwai Nagar is currently represented by BJP MLA Mahesh Trivedi. He has been given ticket by BJP again and is pitted against Congress stalwart and 4-term MLA Ajay Kapoor. The contest on this seat, said a local journalist, is completely bipolar. He lost the previous election to BJP’s Mahesh Trivedi by 33,983 votes.

Sirathu: Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya is up against SP supported AD(K) candidate Pallavi Patel. Maurya won this seat in 2012 too. BJP’s Sheetla Prasad defeated Samajwadi Party’s Vachaspati by 26,203 votes. Interestingly, BSP’s Muslim candidate Saeedurrab polled 43,782 votes.

Mau Sadar: Popular Purvanchal don Mukhtar Ansari, currently languishing in Banda jail, is the incumbent MLA from this seat. He hasn’t lost a single election from this seat since 1996. This time it will be his son Abbas Ansari who contested on father’s stronghold on the SBSP symbol as an SP supported candidate. Abbas contested the 2017 election from Ghosi seat but lost to BJP’s Fagu Chauhan by a margin of 7,003 votes. He is pitched against BJP’s Ashok Singh.

Lucknow cantonment: A seat that was in the news for so many top faces of BJP expressing their wish to contest on this party stronghold seat. It included the likes of Aparna Yadav, Mayank Joshi (son of Rita Bahuguna Joshi), Suresh Chandra Tiwari (sitting MLA) but BJP surprised everyone by fielding its Lucknow Central MLA and UP Law minister Brajesh Pathak. Mayank Joshi joined SP in the presence of Akhilesh Yadav during the last phase of campaigning.

Brajesh Pathak is pitted against Congress’ Dilpreet Singh and SP’s Raju Gandhi. BJP’s Suresh Chandra Tiwari defeated SP’s Major Ashish Chaturvedi in 2019 bypoll by 35,428 votes.

Kairana: The seat became interesting ever since the sitting SP MLA Nahid Hasan was sent to jail. His sister Iqra Hasan took the entire campaigning in her own hands. BJP has fielded its former candidate Mriganka Singh again. Even in 2017, when SP was reduced to 47, Nahid Hasan not only won the seat but defeated BJP’s Mriganka Singh by over 20,000 votes.

Published on: Wednesday, March 09, 2022, 08:50 PM IST