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Lok Sabha election 2019: ‘BJP will come back to power,’ says Yogi Adityanath
Bhojpuri actor and the BJP’s candidate Ravi Kishan from Gorakhpur was seen with the chief minister at the polling booth as he cast his vote.
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday sounded confident of a second term for his Bharatiya Janata Party as eight states, including his, and a Union territory are polling in the seventh and the last phase of the Lok Sabha election.
“The BJP will return to power on the spectacular work done by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the last five years,” Yogi Adityanath said while speaking to reporters after casting his vote in Gorakhpur.
“People are fighting this election for the country… And the common voter is participating in the electoral process keeping the country in mind,” he said.
Bhojpuri actor and the BJP’s candidate Ravi Kishan from Gorakhpur was seen with the chief minister at the polling booth as he cast his vote.
Adityanath had represented Gorakhpur in Parliament for 19 years before the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lost the seat in the 2018 by-poll as he vacated it after taking over as Uttar Pradesh chief minister in 2017. He had won the seat in 2014 by defeating his nearest rival Rajmati Nishad of the SP by a whopping margin of 3.12 lakh votes.
Ravi Kishan is in a tough straight contest against Samajwadi Party-Bahujan Samaj Party alliance candidate Ram Bhuwal Nishad. Nishad belongs to dominant Nishad caste, which accounts for 16% of the population.
Madhusudhan Tiwari of the Congress party is also in the fray.
Adityanath has tried to pull out all the stops to ensure that the BJP wins back the seat. The chief minister virtually turned Gorakhpur’s Gorakhnath Mutt, which he heads, into a virtual war room in the run-up to the polls and oversaw the preparations.
Political analyst Manoj Singh said it may not be easy for the BJP, which lost Gorakhpur in 2018 for the first time since 1989. He said the BSP-SP alliance enjoys support among Yadavs, Muslims, Dalits and Nishads, which roughly account for 50% of the population.
The votes will be counted on May 23.
