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BSP MP Sangeeta Azad joins BJP, may become Lalganj pick
BSP Dalit MP Sangeeta Azad from Lalganj joins BJP in Delhi. Her move ahead of UP candidate list suggests she may contest from Lalganj in 2024 polls.
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) Dalit MP Sangeeta Azad, who represents the Lalganj seat in East UP, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Delhi on Monday evening.
Her joining came on a day when top ruling party leaders, including chief minister Yogi Adityanath, deputy CMs Keshav Prasad Maurya and Brajesh Pathak and state party chief Bhupendra Chaudhary, were in the national capital for a core group meeting of the party’s state leaders before the party’s election committee, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, cleared the names for the second list of UP candidates for 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Lalganj was among 16 Lok Sabha seats that the BJP had lost in U.P. in 2019. Azad’s joining ahead of the declaration of the party’s second list meant that she could figure as the party pick from Lalganj in Azamgarh, party leaders admitted.
This was the template the BJP had followed in Ambedkar Nagar, also one of the 16 Lok Sabha seats the BJP had lost in 2019. Soon after inducting BSP’s Ambedkar Nagar MP Ritesh Pandey, the party named him as its candidate from the same seat in its first list.
Azad joined the BJP in the presence of its national general secretary Vinod Tawde, deputy CM Brajesh Pathak and U.P. BJP chief Bhupendra Singh. Lawyer Seema Kushwaha, who has been associated with legal cases involving women victims, also joined the party.
“The BJP will give Azad full opportunity to make her contributions,” Tawde said. Before Azad, the BJP had inducted Congress’s three-term MLA and co-in-charge for Bihar Ajay Kapoor on March 13. Considered close to the Congress leadership, Kapoor was among the Congress’ probable candidates for Kanpur in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Both Kapoor and Azad made identical statements stating that they had joined the BJP due to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s charisma and policies.
The BSP had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha election in alliance with the SP and won 10 seats. These included Ghazipur, Ghosi, Lalganj, Jaunpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Shravasti seats in East UP and Saharanpur, Nagina, Bijnor, Amroha in West UP. Of these 10 MPs, a majority have either joined different political parties or are holding talks over their prospects since BSP chief Mayawati was unlikely to repeat them, BSP leaders said.
BSP’s sitting MPs including Afzal Ansari (Ghazipur), Sangeeta Azad (Lalganj), Ritesh Pandey (Ambedkar Nagar), Danish Ali (Amroha), Shyam Singh Yadav (Jaunpur) all have deserted the party while Mayawati has denied ticket to Haji Fazlur Rehman (Saharanpur) and Malook Nagar (Bijnor). The fate of BSP’s Ghosi MP Atul Rai is also uncertain and so is the case with Ram Shiromani Verma, the MP from Shravasti. Girish Chandra Jatav MP from Nagina seat, a close aide of Mayawati is, however, hopeful of a ticket, party leaders said.
