Haze lifts over picture of BJP’s capital candidates

Lucknow: Although there is a tough contest in all the 403 assembly seats in UP, all eyes were on the assembly seats of the state capital.

While Congress, BSP and AAP had already announced the names of candidates, the BJP and SP camps were maintaining suspense.

On Tuesday, after the names of Lucknow candidates were announced by the SP, the BJP, too, revealed all its cards, announcing candidates for all the seats in the capital.

The process of nomination for the nine assembly seats of the capital Lucknow was heading towards its final round, but the BJP and the SP camp were seemingly not ready to unveil the mystery of the names of the candidates.

In fact, for the BJP, which had bagged eight out of nine seats in the last elections, this time a very complicated situation had arisen.

On the one hand, the party was faced with the challenge of adjusting the three mini of the Yogi govt, Brajesh Pathak, Ashutosh Tandon and Swati Singh, who belong to the capital Lucknow, and on the other hand, the contenders for the seats, which are considered safe for the BJP, posed a tough challenge to the party strategists.

The tussle between minister Swati Singh and her husband and influential BJP leader Dayashankar over getting the ticket from Sarojini Nagar seat was creating a humiliating situation for the party.

The situation was further complicated due to a large number of contenders for the Cantt seat.

BJP MP Rita Bahuguna Joshi was keen to field her son Mayank Joshi from here but could not get a nod from the high command. Mulayam’s daughter-in-law and BJP’s new member Aparna Yadav was also being considered as a contender for this seat.

Reshu Bhatia, daughterin-law of the Mayor of Lucknow, and also many office-bearers of BJP organisation had also expressed their desire to contest from this seat.

The BJP candidates announced are Jaya Devi from Malihabad, Yogesh Shukla from Bakshi Ka Talab, Anjani Srivastava from Lko West, Neeraj Bora from Lko North, Rajneesh Gupta from Lko Central, Amresh Kumar from Mohanlalganj.

Among the ministers, Ashutosh Tandon will contest from Lko East and Brijesh Pathak will contest from Lko Cantt. Rajeshwar Singh, former officer of the ED, bagged the ticket from Sarojini Nagar seat.