In the year 2022, the election of Kunda assembly seat of Uttar Pradesh had become very exciting. Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav had said without taking the name of MLA Raja Bhaiya that the latch would be put on the hinge. Interestingly, this same Raja Bhaiya used to be a minister when Akhilesh Yadav was the CM. Now after five years, Akhilesh Yadav is doing special fortification for Kunda. The effect of this has been that now Raja Bhaiya has increased his closeness to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). On Monday, when BJP state president Pankaj Chaudhary reached Raja Bhaiya's house to meet him, the murmur became more intense. Now there is discussion that Raja Bhaiya's party i.e. Jansatta Dal (Loktantrik) may also have an alliance with BJP. It is believed that these efforts have started after the game played by Akhilesh Yadav in Pratapgarh.
Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya has been winning elections in Kunda since 1993. Raja Bhaiya, who was an independent MLA till 2022, won the elections in 2022 on his Jansatta Dal (Democratic) ticket. After three elections, it happened in 2022 that Samajwadi Party also fielded its candidate against Raja Bhaiya whereas till now he had been contesting the elections with the support of SP. There was a very exciting fight in 2022 and Raja Bhaiya, who won the last election by a margin of more than 1 lakh votes, won the election by a margin of only 30,315 votes. Since then the discussion had started that now Raja Bhaiya will also have to think afresh.
Has the alliance become a compulsion?
BJP has not been able to win the election from Kunda assembly seat since 1991. It has never won the Babaganj assembly seat. On the other hand, Raja Bhaiya has also been away from power for 10 years and now he too is facing challenges in his stronghold. In such a situation, it is believed that this alliance has become a necessity as well as a compulsion. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, with the tacit support of Raja Bhaiya, SP won both Pratapgarh and Kaushambi Lok Sabha seats. In such a situation, now BJP does not want to take risk and wants to bring Raja Bhaiya to its side by any means.
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One reason for this was Jansatta Dal contesting elections on some seats in 2022. For example, in Gauriganj assembly seat, BJP lost the election by only 6963 votes and Jansatta Dal candidate Chaudhary Nafees Ahmed got 7056 votes. There were some other seats also where Raja Bhaiya had fielded his candidates and BJP was defeated there.
Akhilesh Yadav built fortifications
Recently, three such leaders have joined SP who may have become weak now but are considered important in the politics of giving the message. The first leader is Yogendra Nath Mishra alias Maula Maharaj. He had contested elections against Raja Bhaiya on Bahujan Samaj Party ticket in 2002 when SP had also fielded its candidate. He had also contested elections on BJP ticket from Phaphamau Assembly seat (then Nawabganj) of Prayagraj in 2007. It is believed that with his arrival, some Brahmin voters will definitely join SP. He has been in BJP for a long time and also held the post of District Vice President. Now he has joined SP.
The second leader is Keshav Pasi. Let us tell you that Vinod Saroj, supported by Raja Bhaiya, is winning the elections for three consecutive times on this seat which came into existence under the name Babaganj after the delimitation of 2022. She was the second MLA to win on Jansatta Dal ticket in 2022. Even before this, when the name of this assembly constituency was Bihar, Vinod Saroj had won the election once. Vinod Saroj's father Ramnath Saroj had also won the Bihar Assembly seat twice.
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Let us tell you that Keshav Pasi was the BJP candidate from this Babaganj seat in the year 2022. Then he got 30,391 votes. Interestingly, SP was at second position in that election and SP's Girish Pasi got 51,515 votes. Vinod Saroj got 67,282 votes and won the election by a margin of 15,767 votes. In 2017, when SP was together, the same Vinod Saroj had won the elections by a margin of 37,160 votes.
Shailendra Kumar also changed sides
When Raja Bhaiya, who was among the supporters of SP, formed his own party and distanced himself from SP, Shailendra Kumar had gone with him. Now the same Shailendra Kumar has joined SP. Earlier in 2009, the same Shailendra Kumar was elected as SP MP from Kaushambi Lok Sabha seat. In 2004 and 1998, he was elected as SP MP from the Lok Sabha seat named Chail. Later this Chail Lok Sabha seat became Kaushambi. Interestingly, while Raja Bhaiya and Vinod Saroj were elected as independents, Shailendra Kumar won the elections by contesting on SP ticket.
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After Jansatta Dal became democratic, Raja Bhaiya made Shailendra Kumar contest the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. He finished third and BJP's Vinod Sonkar won the election for the second consecutive time. In 2014, the same Shailendra Kumar stood second by contesting the elections on SP ticket. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Raja Bhaiya's party did not field a candidate from Kaushambi seat and supported SP's Pushpendra Saroj. Then Pushpendra Saroj won the election and Shailendra Kumar was left empty handed. Now it is believed that he can be SP's candidate on any reserved seat of Kaushambi or Prayagraj. It is also possible that he may be seen fighting with his old partner Vinod Sonkar on Babaganj seat.
What happened in 2022?
For the first time, Raja Bhaiya had contested the elections on the ticket of any party in the 2022 assembly elections. The party was of his own creation i.e. Jansatta Dal (Democratic). The party had fielded about a dozen candidates but everyone's eyes were on Kunda. Raja Bhaiya, who had been fighting the opposition till now in name only, had to face the SP which had been supporting him this time. SP played another gamble and gave ticket to Gulshan Yadav, who was once very close to Raja Bhaiya. Gulshan Yadav, who was repeatedly in and out of jail on various charges, gave a tremendous challenge to Raja Bhaiya.
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Akhilesh Yadav's statement of 'lock the pot' added fuel to the fire. When Raja Bhaiya expressed strong opposition to this statement, the matter became high voltage. Many people in Kunda supported SP, albeit secretly. Its effect was visible in the election results. When the votes were counted, it was shown that Raja Bhaiya got less votes than in 2017. Raja Bhaiya, who won by a margin of 1.03 lakh votes after getting 1.36 lakh votes in 2017, did not get even one lakh votes this time. He remained the winner by getting 99,612 votes but his victory margin came down to 30,315. This was the lowest margin of his victory in a total of five elections i.e. 2002, 2007, 2012, 2017 and 2022. At the same time, Gulshan Yadav gave him a tough competition and secured 69,297 votes. In comparison to Gulshan, BJP candidate Sindhuja Mishra Senani got only 16,455 votes and BSP's Mohammad Faheem got only 3345 votes.
Now BJP needs to add a strong partner to strengthen its position on some seats and focus on increasing two seats in Kunda-Babaganj without any contest. At the same time, there is a need for Raja Bhaiya to eliminate the possible triangular elections on both the assembly seats and compete directly with SP and keep his position strong. In this sequence, he himself is active in his field, his two sons are continuously doing public relations and next month he is also organizing the story of Dhirendra Shastri so that he can keep people connected with him and can take advantage of it in the elections also.