Lucknow, Sep 26 Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav’s visit to Raebareli, a Congress bastion, ahead of the next year’s assembly polls sparked a war of words between the allies, with the grand old party announcing plans to enter SP strongholds and veteran Shivpal Yadav hitting back, saying it would not yield them any votes.
It started when Akhilesh kicked off his party’s campaign for the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections by launching the ‘PDA Rath Yatra’ from Raebareli on September 24.
The move triggered a fierce backlash from its ally Congress, with the party’s UP chief Ajai Rai declaring that the grand old party would also visit SP bastions.
Reacting to Rai’s remarks, Samajwadi Party veteran and six-term lawmaker from Jaswantnagar, Shivpal Yadav, on Saturday asserted that Congress won’t be receiving any votes in SP bastions even if it tries to make inroads there.
“Anyone can indeed visit anywhere, so let them visit. Even if they (Congress) do try, they won’t achieve anything, any votes in whole Jaswantnagar,” Shivpal said, igniting fresh controversy over SP-Congress relationship.
On Friday, Rai told PTI, “Anyone is free to visit any part of the country. He (Akhilesh) visited Raebareli, and there is nothing wrong with it. We, too, will surely visit places like Varanasi or, for that matter, Etawah, Kannauj and Mainpuri.”
The places Rai cited are all Samajwadi strongholds. Akhilesh Yadav represents Kannauj in the Lok Sabha, his wife Dimple is the Mainpuri MP, while Akhilesh’s uncle Shivpal is the MLA from Jaswantnagar.
Shivpal reached Mumbai later in the day, with his aide, who is travelling with the SP veteran, describing the SP leader’s visit as a “personal trip”. Asked if there was more to the issue than met the eye, Shivpal’s aide sought to play down the issue.
“He (Shivpal) was reacting to a Congress leader, who said his party leaders could also visit places like Jaswantnagar. Responding to this, he (Shivpal) said anyone can go anywhere. But as for its political outcome, there are none,” the aide told PTI.
Akhilesh’s Raebareli visit comes as the SP is yet to announce a detailed itinerary for a formal launch of Yadav’s PDA Rath Yatra. It has maintained that the Thursday visit by the SP chief to Raebareli was to meet the party’s Harchandpur MLA Rahul Lodhi, who had alleged that he, some SP workers and local leaders, were manhandled by police, following the September 17 clash involving Samajwadi Chhatra Sabha and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) members.
The SP leaders, however, admitted that Akhilesh’s Raebareli visit was a huge success.
“Though undertaken to visit a party MLA, who was a victim of this BJP government’s high-handedness, this visit by the party chief to Raebareli was a roaring hit. The response of the people was amazing and the writing on the wall loud and clear,” former minister and SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary told PTI.
Raebareli is represented by Rahul Gandhi in the Lok Sabha. However, the Congress didn’t win the assembly seat in the 2022 UP polls.
Of the five assembly seats that make up Rahul Gandhi’s Raebareli Lok Sabha seat, SP holds three, Bachhrawan, Harchandpur and Sareni, while the BJP holds the remaining two — Raebareli and Unchahar.
As Shivpal joined the ongoing war of words, the BJP found reason to target the two parties, who, after their successful 2024 Lok Sabha alliance, are again widely tipped to enter into another alliance though they are yet to reveal any seat-sharing agreement.
The BJP had on Thursday claimed Akhilesh’s Raebareli visit was to demonstrate SP’s political strength in the constituency and question the Congress’s position there.
“Ideally, the Congress should now begin its political campaign from Kannauj and Mainpuri,” BJP spokesman Rakesh Tripathi had said.
The BJP also recalled how the recent statements by Congress MP Imran Masood and SP MP Iqra Hasan, pitching their respective party leaders Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav as the main opposition face, showcased that the two opposition parties were involved in a tussle for one-upmanship ahead of 2027 UP polls.
The Congress has consistently maintained that Rahul Gandhi was the most prominent opposition voice in the country.
“There is no denying Rahul ji is the most prominent opposition leader capable of taking on BJP,” Rai said.
“We are the foot soldiers of the Congress and busy ensuring organisational preparedness in UP ahead of the elections. The when, why, whether and what of the alliance (between Congress and SP) would be decided by the party leadership,” he said.
During the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the SP-Congress alliance bagged 43 seats in UP, of which SP won 37 and the Congress 6, limiting the BJP to 33 seats.
Despite BJP’s win in a series of bypolls held since, including the Milkipur assembly seat, which is part of the Faizabad Lok Sabha, the poll narrative has mostly focused on whether the two parties can reach a seat-sharing agreement for the crucial UP polls due next year.
(PTI News)
