Keen contest on cards at UP legislative council polls today

LUCKNOW: Around 10 pm on Wednesday, Union finance minister ArunJaitley made a surprise call to RashtriyaLokDal (RLD) chief Ajit Singh. Travelling abroad in a few hours, Jaitley spoke to Singh for more than 20 minutes in an attempt to win over RLD’s support for the BJP, ahead of Friday’s legislative council polls.
The message from the BJP top brass was clear; it’s a high stakes election where not only the state leadership, but also national leaders are involved.
For the BJP, fielding two candidates is a gamble and a battle of prestige. With its current tally, the party only has the assurance of one nominee securing a victory. The BJP’s second candidate, Daya Shankar Singh, though, is a risk. Singh, a BJP secretary, claims he is banking on the support of fellow Rajput MLAs and says he is confident of their support. Singh’s abilities as a good “manager” are also well known.
Even though the party’s leadership may claim rivals will listen to the voices of their conscience the betting game is open, and there’s open talk of the BJP trying to wrest MLAs from other political outfits. For their second candidate, BJP has only 10 MLAs. It needs the support of an additional 21 MLAs for Singh to win. With former DGP Brij Lal and RS member Jugal Kishore of the BSP joining BJP, the party is hoping for a leg up in the MLC polls. The BJP is also seen reaching out to the upper caste MLAs in the BSP ranks.
Apart from the BSP camp, which is starting to come apart, MLAs in the Congress and RLD camp are also soft targets for poaching. Both have not fielded candidates for the MLC elections since they were neither capable of ensuring a victory alone. The Congress has 28 MLAs, while the RLD has 8.
The Congress, instead, has promised to support the Samajwadi Party. The problem, though, is that Congress’ own flock is not entirely united, with at least a few breakaway factions in the public domain. Sources said many MLAs are in touch with the BJP leaders. The same is true of RLD, where MLAs are cut up about an alliance with the BSP even when party chief Mayawati has ruled out any tie-up in the 2017 assembly elections.
None of the mathematics has stopped the top leadership of all parties from attempting to woo MLAs. If BJP’s UP in charge and national general secretary Om Mathur holds fort for BJP, SP general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav has camped in Lucknow for four days to ensure SP’s eight win smoothly. After their loss in the recent Cantonment Board elections in Lucknow and Varanasi, BJP does not want another successive defeat in the Council election.
Incidentally, Raghuraj Pratap Singh, alias Raja Bhaiyya, who is currently a minister in the SP government, leads the group of independent MLAs in the UP assembly. So far, this group has promised to support the SP.
On Friday, polling for MLC elections will be held between 9 am and 4 pm at the UP legislative assembly.