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U.P. MLC polls: BJP declares candidates, picks old party hands
All the seven BJP candidates are old party hands including Vijay Bahadur Pathak, former minister Mahendra Kumar Singh and former Lucknow University Students Union president Santosh Singh
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday declared its MLC picks for the March 21 biennial polls to 13 Uttar Pradesh legislative council seats, repeating three candidates while leaving out as many seats for its allies in Uttar Pradesh.
All the seven candidates the BJP named are old party hands and through their selection, the party has chosen to convey a message to the cadre that the leadership has them in their plans. The message is more significant as this is the last electoral exercise ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The BJP on Saturday named party vice president Vijay Bahadur Pathak and former ministers Mahendra Kumar Singh and Ashok Kataria for a second consecutive six-year term to the state legislative council along with state vice presidents Mohit Beniwal, an IITian from Delhi, former Lucknow University Students Union chief Santosh Singh, Dharmendra Singh and former Jhansi mayor Ram Tirath Singhal for the first time. Of the 7 names, 4 are upper caste and 2 OBC candidates.
Out of the 13 MLCs whose term is ending on May 5, 10 belong to the BJP, while the SP, BSP, and Apna Dal (Sonelal) have a member each. “I am overwhelmed and grateful to the party leadership,” said BJP MLC and vice-president Vijay Bahadur Pathak soon after the party declared its list.
The BJP is sure of getting 10 MLCs re-elected though as of now it appears that having left out one seat for Apna Dal (S), state working chief Ashish Patel and UP minister is set for a second term. The BJP has left one seat for its new ally Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) which has named Yogesh Choudhary as its candidate. The BJP is expected to leave one more seat possibly for Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP).
Chief of Nishad Party Sanjay Nishad, a U.P. minister too, is also an MLC with BJP backing. The 403-member UP assembly has a present strength of 399. Apart from BJP, only SP has numbers in the U.P. assembly to get 3 MLCs elected. If either BJP or SP field an additional candidate, there would be a contest which then would open the prospect of cross voting as was witnessed in the recent Rajya Sabha polls.
If either of the parties force a contest, the quota (number of MLAs needed to ensure win of each MLC) would come into play. “In case of a contest, 29 MLA votes would be needed by each MLC candidate to win,” an official said.
With three MLAs in jail and unlikely to vote (as was the case in RS polls), the effective voting strength would be further reduced to 396. On its current strength, the BJP-led-National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has 286 MLAs and with the support of 2 MLAs of Kunda lawmaker Raja Bhaiya’s Jansatta Dal (Lok Tantrik) party, this goes up to 288. NDA includes BJP (252), Apna Dal-S (13), RLD (9), SBSP (6) and Nishad Party (6).
The NDA now also enjoys the tacit support of eight rebel SP lawmakers who are expected to back BJP picks taking the effective strength of voters to 296. However, two of its MLAs - SBSP lawmaker – Abbas Ansari (Mau) are in jail and another lawmaker Jagdish Narain Rai cross voted in favour of the Samajwadi Party in Rajya Sabha polls, reducing the NDA numbers to 294.
The lone BSP lawmaker in UP assembly had also backed the BJP in Rajya Sabha and if the trend holds on, it will mean BJP would have support of 295 lawmakers.
On the other hand, the INDIA bloc led by the Samajwadi Party and Congress have 110 MLAs and one cross-voting SBSP lawmaker in the Rajya Sabha means an additional supporter for the Vidhan Parishad. However, with two lawmakers in jail (Irfan Solanki and Ramakant Yadav) and eight turning rebels, the effective strength of the opposition bloc would be 101.
This means that the BJP will now be able to get 10 MLCs elected, one more than what it may win with its own numbers. Meanwhile, the Samajwadi Party may get three of its candidates elected (87 votes) and still be left with 14 spare votes, which is 15 short of the desired 29 votes needed to try its luck for the fourth candidate.
