BJP confident of winning all 11 seats in UP bypoll

Lucknow: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Uttar Pradesh is confident of winning all the 11 Assembly seats in the bypoll to be held on October 21.

"The mood among the people is upbeat, the performance of the State and Central government is good and the Opposition has no issues against us. We are confident of our victory in the by-elections," said Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Maurya.

The BJP held nine out of the eleven seats that are going to the polls while the Samajwadi Party (SP) had the Rampur seat and the Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP) held the Jalalpur seat.

The BJP is contesting ten seats out of the eleven seats while one seat (Pratapgarh) has been given to Apna Dal.

"Things have changed in favour of the BJP now. The abrogation of Article 370 and triple talaq have propelled the mood in favour of the BJP. We are going to win by a greater margin than in 2017," Maurya said.

However, the BJP is perturbed over the results of the by-elections in Hamirpur declared last month. The BJP vote share fell from 44.49 per cent in 2017 to 38.55 per cent in 2019 and the BJP candidate Yuvraj Singh could win the elections with a margin of 17,771 votes.

The SP, on the other hand registered an increase of about 4 per cent votes in the by-election.

The BJP is now channelising all its energy into the by-elections.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath will start addressing election meetings in all the constituencies where by-elections are being held from October 15. State BJP president Swatantra Dev Singh and organising secretary Sunil Bansal have already toured the constituencies.

Party leaders are working at the booth level to ensure proper mobilisation of voters on the polling day. The party is also holding caste conferences with special focus on farmers, Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and Dalits.

Ministers, who are in charge of these constituencies, are also camping there to monitor the progress of the campaign.

"Our party cadres are also fanning out to create awareness on abrogation of Article 370 and triple talaq. This is primarily to dispel the misconceptions that the Opposition is trying to create on these issues," said a party functionary.

The Opposition parties, however, are in a state of disarray and pose no threat to the BJP in these by-elections.

A BJP leader said, "The SP will try to play the victim card in Rampur where SP MP Azam Khan's wife is their candidate, but our campaign will also focus on the 'reign of terror' that was unleashed in Rampur during the SP regime."

The BSP, on the other hand, is unsure whether Mayawati will campaign in the by-elections or not. Candidates are banking solely on the Dalit vote base for the by-elections.

The Congress, however, plans to work seriously on the by-elections and party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is expected to camp in Lucknow for two days from October 14 to work out a strategy.

However, the party is facing growing resentment over the new organisational set up and the candidates are not likely to get much support from the cadres.

A demoralised and disintegrated Opposition will obviously work to the advantage of the BJP.

Meanwhile, the seats where by-elections are being held include Pratapgarh, Lucknow Cantt, Rampur, Gangoh, Govindpur, Jalalpur, Zaidpur, Iglas, Manikpur, Ghosi and Balha.

The by-election in Tundla has been postponed since the matter is in court while the by-poll in Hamirpur has already been held.