Kairana by-polls see Opposition unity against ruling BJP

Today in Uttar Pradesh, Lok Sabha by-polls are to take place in Kairana which shows a tough match against the ruling BJP and the Opposition in unity.

Located around 630 km from capital city of Lucknow, the Lok Sabha constituency has five assembly segments namely Shamli, Thana Bhawan and Kairana in Shamli district, and Gangoh and Nakur in Saharanpur district. There are nearly 17 lakh voters in the constituency with a significant number of Muslims, Jats and Dalit voters.

The Kairana by-polls is the most anticipated one which would test the popularity of the ruling BJP, especially among the Jats, Dalits and Most Backward Castes (MBC). 

RLD party worker Abdul Hakeem Khan said he had never seen an election in which the ruling party was being challenged by a joint opposition.

“This is the beauty of our democracy,” he said.

The constituency fell vacant after the death of BJP MP Hukum Singh, whose daughter Mriganka Singh is now the party’s candidate for the bypoll. She is fighting Rashtriya Lok Dal’s (RLD) Tabassum Hasan, who is supported by the Congress, Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.

This bypoll is an ideal opportunity to send out a message that a tactical political combination of Jat, Muslims and Dalits in West UP is evolving into a force to reckon with ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. 

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Following its defeat in the recent Lok Sabha by-polls in eastern UP’s Gorakhpur and Phulpur, BJP has perhaps realised the challenges of winning a difficult constituency like Kairana. This has probably prodded the party to step up its campaign efforts there. 

While UP chief minister Yogi Aditya Nath has addressed two meetings at Nakur (Saharanpur) and Shamli, deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya and BJP’s state president Mahendra Nath Pandey have also spent a good deal of time in different parts of Kairana. Of the five assembly seats which Kairana Lok Sabha seat accommodates, the BJP had won Shamli, Thana Bhavan, Gangoh and Nakur in the 2017 assembly elections. 

However, it could not win Kairana, which was won by the SP. Apart from Muslims, the Kairana constituency has a good presence of MBC voters like Kashyap, Sainis and Kumhars. 

“They are decisive factors in different parts of this LS constituency. The BJP has given special focus on MBC voters in this by-election,” a source in the UP BJP said. 

BJP also deployed its local faces, particularly MLAs, in Kairana during the campaign. This time, the battle appears to be equally tough for both the BJP and Opposition parties in Kairana. 

If RLD performs well, it would automatically expedite the process for unifying opposition parties like SP, BSP and Congress. While BSP has silently worked to defeat the BJP, SP leaders like state president Naresh Uttam has camped in Kairana to ensure proper coordination between RLD and his party. 

If BJP retains this seat, it would be an opportunity for it to counter the opposition parties’ claim about its shrinking base in West UP ahead of the 2019 LS battle. 

Apart from Kairana, by-poll to Noorpur assembly constituency in the state will also be held today.