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UP polls: Chandrashekhar Azad announces alliance of 35 smaller parties

This alliance for the UP polls, named the Samajik Parivartan Morcha, will not field a candidate against Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav

Published on: Jan 23, 2022, 22:03:03 IST
By , Lucknow
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Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad, who also heads the Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), announced an alliance of 35 smaller political parties for the UP polls. The new alliance has been named the Samajik Parivartan Morcha.

Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) chief Chandrashekhar Azad addresses a press conference regarding the formation of an alliance for the UP polls, in Lucknow on Sunday. (ANI PHOTO)
Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) chief Chandrashekhar Azad addresses a press conference regarding the formation of an alliance for the UP polls, in Lucknow on Sunday. (ANI PHOTO)

Chandrashekhar Azad, who had announced he would contest the election from the Gorakhpur urban assembly seat against chief minister Yogi Adityanath, said the alliance will not field a candidate against Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav who would contest from Karhal in Mainpuri district.

“The Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), the political outfit of the Bhim Army, has formed a pre-poll alliance with 35 smaller political parties to contest the UP polls,” Chandrashekhar Azad said at a press conference at the party’s state unit office in Lucknow on Sunday.

The alliance will field candidates on all the 403 assembly seats in the UP polls, he said.

The announcement by Chandrashekhar Azad comes a day after All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) led by Asaduddin Owaisi on Saturday announced the launch of Bhagidari Parivartan Morcha of five political parties. Owaisi had said the alliance had kept its doors open for other smaller parties, including Bhim Army.

Chandrashekar Azad said the Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) will not tie up with the big or established political parties, but will form an alliance with the smaller political parties who are fighting for the rights of the Dalits, OBCs (other backward classes), tribals and Muslims. The alliance will release its manifesto for the assembly elections soon, he said.

Prominent OBC leaders who joined the alliance included Babu Ram Pal and Raj Kumar Saini.

Chandrashekhar Azad said he will launch his election campaign for the Gorakhpur urban assembly seat within a week.

Before that, he will hold a virtual meeting with the party workers in Gorakhpur and the work to establish committees at booth level has started, Chandrashekhar Azad said.

  • Rajesh Kumar Singh
    ABOUT THE AUTHOR
    Rajesh Kumar Singh

    Rajesh Kumar Singh is Assistant Editor, Hindustan Times, at the political bureau in Lucknow. An Alumnus of Ramjas College, Delhi and the University of Delhi, he has covered politics in the Hindi heartland Uttar Pradesh and Bihar for three decades and has written extensively on Dalit and OBC politics. He travelled across Uttar Pradesh to cover the panchayat, assembly and Lok Sabha elections. Along with writing on development issues, governance and public policy has done crime reporting, including Maoist activities in Bihar as well as activities of gangsters in East Uttar Pradesh, Jungle Party gang active on UP- Bihar border, dacoit gangs in Bundelkhand region and Sand Mafia active in various districts of UP. Has done investigations and reporting exposing multi-crore NRHM scam in UP, Nutrition scam, Medicine supply scam, irregularities in the flood management projects, weapon smuggling and human trafficking on Indo- Nepal border. He highlighted the deaths of children due to encephalitis in the districts of East Uttar Pradesh; the central and state government took cognisance of the report to launch schemes to check deaths and improve the facilities in the health centres and hospitals. He also reported on the social issues in East Uttar Pradesh and Bundelkhand- migration, farming crisis, water crisis, plight of the deprived communities- Musahar, Vantongiyas, Sahariya and Kol communities. He covers state government departments. He also travels to write human-interest stories and in-depth stories from the ground in the Bundelkhand, Purvanchal, and Rohilkhand regions of Uttar Pradesh.Read More