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Lok Sabha Polls 2024: Battle royale between legacies on cards in Allahabad
BJP's Neeraj Tripathi vs. Congress' Ujjwal Raman Singh for Allahabad seat. Son of former UP Assembly speaker vs. son of eight-time MLA.
It will be a fight between two political legacies for the prestigious Allahabad parliamentary seat on May 20.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has pitted Neeraj Tripathi, the son of former West Bengal governor and former UP Assembly speaker Keshari Nath Tripathi, against Congress’ Ujjwal Raman Singh, whose father Rewati Raman, an eight-time MLA, won the very same seat twice (in 2004 and 2009).
Singh has the full backing of his former colleague and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav.
Though Neeraj, who has been the additional advocate general of Uttar Pradesh since June 2018, has not been active in politics thus far, his wife Kavita Tripathi is currently serving as the state secretary of the BJP Mahila Morcha. In the 2022 assembly elections, Kavita vied for a ticket from the Allahabad North assembly seat, but the saffron party decided to field then-sitting MLA Harshvardhan Bajpai.
Keshari Nath represented two assembly constituencies a total of six times. His first win was from Jhunsi (1977-1980) on a Janata Party ticket after which he was appointed a cabinet minister.
After joining the BJP when it was founded in April 1980, he won the Allahabad South seat five times in a row from 1989 to 2007.
Meanwhile, senior SP leader Rewati Raman, popularly called ‘Mani ji’, holds the record for being an eight-time MLA from Karachhana of Prayagraj (1974-2004). He also served as a cabinet minister twice in 1979-1980 and 1989-90.
Praveen Patel looks to recreate father’s charm
The BJP’s bet on Praveen Patel, a two-time MLA from Phulpur, as its candidate for the Phulpur parliamentary seat is being viewed as proof that the trust bestowed on him is correct.
Patel won his first assembly election from Phulpur in 2007 on a BSP ticket. One of his opponents was SP’s Vijma Yadav. In 2012, Patel entered the fray again but lost to SP’s Syed Ahmed. Before the 2017 assembly elections, he jumped ship to the BJP and was named its candidate for the same seat. He defeated SP’s Mansoor Alam by bagging 93,912 (42.24%) votes against 67,299 (30.27%) votes polled to Mansoor. Patel’s father late Mahendra Pratap Singh was also an MLA from Jhunsi thrice (as Congress leader in 1985 and then again in 1989 and 1991 as Janata Dal candidate).
Chance of a hattrick for Vinod Sonkar
The BJP reposing its faith in Vinod Sonkar for Kaushambi provides a rare opportunity for him to vie for a hattrick of wins from the parliamentary seat. The development came at a time when two sitting BJP MPs, from neighbouring Allahabad and Phulpur, Reeta Bahuguna Joshi and Keshari Devi Patel both failed to get the party’s backing this time.
Sonkar’s shot to fame came in 2014 when the party fielded him from the Kaushambi parliamentary seat within one year of him joining it. He didn’t disappoint and won the election by 43,000 votes. He repeated this feat in 2019, this time defeating SP’s Indrajeet Saroj by 38,722 votes.
Post his 2019 win from Kaushambi, he was appointed chairman of the ethics committee before being appointed national secretary of the BJP in 2020.
Though the SP-Congress alliance is yet to declare its candidate from Kaushambi, the BSP has named Deoria’s Shubh Narayan Gautam, a retired police official and former student leader, as its pick for the seat.
