Lucknow: Ahead of the 2027 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, the Samajwadi Party has made “winnability” the central condition for seat sharing within the INDIA alliance, putting ally Congress under pressure during early negotiations.
Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has asked alliance partners to submit names of prospective candidates along with detailed assessments of their electoral strength, according to SP sources. The party leadership is expected to scrutinise each candidate before finalising seat distribution.
The move signals the SP’s intent to maintain complete control over alliance negotiations and reinforce its position as the principal opposition force against the BJP in Uttar Pradesh.
SP insiders said the party believes alliances can succeed only when candidates have strong caste equations, local organisational backing and personal voter bases. Leaders feel that distributing seats merely for political accommodation could weaken the opposition’s challenge to the BJP.
The strategy has complicated discussions with the Congress. Congress leaders are believed to be seeking around 150 seats in the 402-member Assembly, citing the party’s national presence and role in the INDIA bloc. However, SP leaders privately maintain that the Congress lacks strong candidates in most constituencies and may not be offered more than 40 seats.
SP leaders also remain cautious amid reports that some Congress leaders explored the possibility of opening communication channels with the BSP led by Mayawati. SP functionaries want the INDIA alliance in Uttar Pradesh to operate under a framework led by the Samajwadi Party.
Political analyst Ramesh Chandra Dixit said the SP’s aggressive posture reflects Akhilesh Yadav’s confidence after the Lok Sabha elections and his attempt to establish himself as the unquestioned leader of the opposition bloc in Uttar Pradesh. Dixit said the Congress may find it difficult to justify a large seat demand because its organisational structure remains weak in many districts. According to him, the SP wants a performance-based alliance model where every ally must prove electoral strength before claiming seats.
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Party insiders said the SP wants to avoid repeating past alliance experiments where seat-sharing decisions were driven more by political compulsions than by ground realities. According to SP sources, seats will be allotted only after the party is convinced about the electoral viability of candidates, arguing that weak nominees could ultimately benefit the BJP.
Akhilesh Yadav has already publicly asserted that the SP will take the lead in deciding alliance seat distribution in Uttar Pradesh, underlining the party’s ambition to remain the central pole of opposition politics in the state ahead of 2027.
