Lucknow, February 28: Riding on the support of turncoats the Bharatiya Janata Party pipped the Samajwadi Party at the post and won 8 out of 10 seats in the Rajya Sabha election held in Lucknow on Tuesday. “This victory is just a trailer. The picture will come in May 2024 with a resounding victory of BJP in ok Sabha elections,” Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya told FPJ here.
Initially, with the ruling party having the numerical strength to secure only seven seats and the opposition alliance led by SP eyeing three, the dynamics of the election underwent a dramatic shift with the entry of Sanjay Seth and the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) joining the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) last week.
The entry of Seth, a businessman-turned-politician who switched allegiance from the Samajwadi Party to the BJP in 2019, altered the equilibrium. Tensions escalated as certain leaders from the Samajwadi Party, notably former chief whip Manoj Pandey, openly aligned themselves with the BJP.
Among the seven MLAs from the Samajwadi Party who engaged in cross-voting were Rakesh Pandey, Rakesh Pratap Singh, Abhay Singh, Vinod Chaturvedi, Manoj Pandey, Pooja Pal, and Ashutosh Maurya. Allegations arose that five of these leaders even met Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
Further complicating the scenario, two MLAs from the Jansatta Loktantrik party and the sole representative of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) also cast their votes in favor of the NDA candidate, bolstering BJP's path to victory.
The BJP's electoral lineup featured RPN Singh, Chaudhary Tejveer Singh, Amarpal Maurya, Sangeeta Balwant, Sudhanshu Trivedi, Sadhna Singh, Naveen Jain, and Sanjay Seth, while the Samajwadi Party fielded Jaya Bachchan, Ramji Lal Suman, and retired IAS officer Alok Ranjan as their contenders. Of these 11 contestants, Alok Ranjan lost the election.
Akhilesh Says It Was Loyalty Test
Describing the third candidate nomination as a “loyalty test,” Akhilesh Yadav wrote in Hindi on X, “Our decision to contest the third seat in the Rajya Sabha was essentially a litmus test to sift allies from dissenters, and to ascertain who stood with the PDA in spirit and who harbored sentiments contrary to the interests of backward classes, Dalits, and minorities.”
Akhilesh Yadav slammed the rebel MLAs who allegedly cross-voted in favour of the BJP in the Rajya Sabha elections, saying not "everybody has the guts to stand against the government". "Not everybody has the guts to stand against the government...pressure is put on everybody, is there anyone who doesn't know that BJP would go to any extent to win," Yadav said.
SP Workers Protest Cross-Voting:
In a tumultuous turn of events, workers of the Samajwadi Party (SP) expressed vehement dissatisfaction on Tuesday following reports of cross-voting by several SP MLAs in the Rajya Sabha elections. Outraged by this alleged betrayal, demonstrators took to the streets in Lucknow, burning effigies of the implicated MLAs and chanting slogans of condemnation at Parivartan Chowk.
In a symbolic act of defiance, an effigy was set ablaze in front of Lucknow University, marked with the names of MLA Manoj Pandey, Abhay Singh, Rakesh Kumar Pandey, and Pooja Pal. The demonstration, led by activists of Chhatra Sabha, escalated into a road blockade, causing traffic disruption as protestors obstructed vehicles, brandishing posters and banners to amplify their dissent.
Police intervened to disperse the agitated crowd, clearing the roads for normal traffic flow. However, the fervor of the protest remained unabated as Salim Kakori, the District President of SP Youth Brigade, denounced the alleged turncoats as "traitors" who had betrayed the trust of the electorate.
