E-Paper
UP polls: Hat-trick of wins on these three Prayagraj seats still a dream
The voters of these seats have succeeded in giving a new incumbent an opportunity denying the satisfaction to any candidate of a third consecutive win, say poll analysts.
No candidate has ever been able to score a hat-trick of victory on these three seats—Handia, Pratappur and Phaphamau—of the total 12 assembly seats of Prayagraj district till date. The voters of these seats have succeeded in giving a new incumbent an opportunity denying the satisfaction to any candidate of a third consecutive win, say poll analysts.
“Even if one leaves aside the Koraon assembly constituency that came into being only in 2012 and is the only seat of the district that is yet to witness three assembly polls, it is just the remaining eight in the past 70 years that have each recorded a hat-trick of wins by at least one candidate,” said prof MP Dubey, a political commentator and a former vice chancellor of Uttar Pradesh Rajarshi Tandon Open University.
Records of Election Commission of India (ECI) show that Athai Ram won from Handia for two consecutive terms in 1974 (as Bharatiya Kranti Dal (BKP) candidate) and 1977 (as Janata Party (JNP) candidate) while former UP minister Rakesh Dhar Tripathi won twice in 1985 and 1989 here. But both could not score a hat-trick.
In Pratappur, Har Pratap Singh recorded two consecutive victories in 1974 on BKD ticket and 1977 on JNP ticket while Shyamsurat Upadhyay of Congress won in 1980 and 1985 but both of them also failed to score a hat-trick. Rampujan Patel of Congress is the only leader from Phaphamau (then Nawabganj) who won for two consecutive terms in 1969 and 1974 but did not win in 1977.
Apart from him, there has not been any leader who has won twice in a row from here. Due to the ticket being denied by BJP to its sitting MLA Vikramjeet Maurya in Phaphamau, this time also the record of two consecutive wins is out of question.
Allahabad North is the only seat of Prayagraj from where two stalwarts have won four times in a row. Congress’ Rajendra Kumari Bajpai won in 1962, 1967, 1974 and 1977 while BJP’s Narendra Kumar Singh Gaur won in 1991, 1993, 1996 and 2002.
Mafioso-turned-politician Atiq Ahmed won from Allahabad West assembly seat in 1989, 1991, 1993, 1996 and 2002. In Phulpur (then Jhunsi), Mahendra Pratap Singh scored a hat-trick in the elections of 1985, 1989 and 1991 while Bhola Singh of Congress won in 1985, 1989 and 1991 from Soraon.
Similarly, Ramsevak Singh Patel won from Bara in 1991, 1993 and 1996 while Kunwar Revati Raman Singh, who represented Karachhana seven times in legislative assembly, scored a hat-trick in 1985, 1989 and 1991. Kunwar Revati Raman Singh, who had won two consecutive times in 1974 and 1977 as well as in 1996 and 2002 too, missed out on a hat-trick. From Meja, Vishram Das won four times in a row in 1980, 1985, 1989 and 1991.
First hat-trick scorer
When it comes to hat-tricks after the first assembly elections held in 1951-52, Kalyan Chandra Mohile alias Chunnan Guru was the first leader ever from here to score a hat-trick by winning in 1957, 1962 and 1967 elections from the Allahabad South constituency. In Prayagraj, which was a Congress stronghold at that time, non-Congressmen Chunnan Guru had won the elections on the ticket of Praja Socialist Party (PSP) in 1957 and 1962 and SSP in 1967.
From this seat, Pt Keshari Nath Tripathi won five consecutive times from 1989 to 2002.
Three missed hat-trick in 2017
In the last UP assembly elections, three veterans had missed a hat-trick of wins. Pooja Pal, who won from Allahabad West in 2007 and 2012 on a BSP ticket, ended up at number three in 2017. Similarly, Anugrah Narayan Singh, who won from Allahabad North on Congress ticket in 2007 and 2012, lost in 2017. BSP’s Rajbali Jaisal could not make a hat-trick too. In 2007, Jaisal had won from Meja and from Koraon in 2012. But in 2017, he ended up at third place in Koraon.
