The assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh have entered its final and seventh phase with Saturday being the last day for the campaign. A total of 54 assembly constituencies of Purvanchal will go for polling on March 7 while counting for all the phases will be done on March 10.
The high-octane campaign witnessed all parties trying to give up their best shot as Purvanchal is considered to be the bellwether region of the UP Assembly.
On one hand, BJP will be going all out to retain its bastion, its main contender Samajwadi Party will be eyeing to regain the constituencies it won in the 2012 Assembly elections. Also, the seventh and last phase of UP Assembly elections will be a litmus test for allies on both the sides from Anupriya Patel to Om Prakash Rajbhar.
Many seats in the Purvanchal region were once considered a stronghold of the Samajwadi Party. However, in 2017 the bastion was lost to BJP in the Modi wave. In 2017 the SP was able to retain 11 seats in Purvanchal region, while the BJP won 29 seats and its ally Apna Dal (S) had won 3 seats. The Bahujan Samaj Party had also bagged six seats in the region.
In this election, BJP has fielded 48 candidates out of 54 seats on the party symbol while its ally Apna Dal (S) and Nishad Party have fielded 3-3 candidates each. On the other hand, Samajwadi Party has fielded 45 candidates on its symbol while its ally SBSP has fielded 7 candidates and Apna Dal (K) has fielded two candidates.
The bigwigs of BJP including Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with UP CM Yogi Adityanath, BJP Chief JP Nadda, Union Minister Rajnath Singh and Home Minister Amit Shah have been extensively campaigning in Purvanchal to repeat its 2017 success story.
The Samajwadi Party on the other hand is also going all out to regain its bastions like Azamgarh, Ghazipur, Jaunpur and Bhadohi. Samajwadi Party Chief Akhilesh Yadav is the incumbent MP from Azamgarh parliamentary constituency. However, this time for the first time ever, he is contesting assembly elections from Karhal assembly seat of Mainpuri.
Even the Congress party is not in a mood to give up easily on the seats of Purvanchal, the party’s UP in-charge Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has been camping at Kabir Chaura Math in Varanasi in an attempt to galvanise the Dalit voters in Purvanchal, who are in significant numbers here.
The BJP ensured a massive turnout of supporters by holding a roadshow of PM Modi in Varanasi on Friday, while the Samajwadi Party also held a roadshow of Akhilesh Yadav in Varanasi late on Friday evening.
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