The political slugfest seems to be lighting up Uttar Pradesh ahead of by-elections on eight assembly seats after the ruling BJP announced uninterrupted 24-hour power supply to the seats, prompting a reaction from the Samajwadi Party which said the move exposed the lies of the government to the 22 crore people of the state.
The eight districts which will get the power supply are Bulandshahr, Firozabad, Amroha, Rampur, Unnao, Kanpur, Deoria and Jaunpur. These eight districts also house the eight assembly seats that will be going for by-elections soon. Of the eight, two seats of Swar (Rampur) and Malhani (Jaunpur) have never been won by the BJP.
Attacking the Adityanath government, the SP said it had exposed the claim of uninterrupted electricity supply in the state. Former minister and Samajwadi Party leader Abhishek Mishra said, “The BJP government in the state has failed to give electricity supply in Uttar Pradesh. The Samajwadi Party government had invested in transmission, distribution, etc and even doubled the budget allocated for it. The current BJP government has not worked on transmission and production of electricity and didn’t even increase the budget. The entire system has collapsed under the current regime.”
He added, “Now orders have been given to supply 24 hours electricity in eight districts which will be having by-elections, exposing the government. They had made tall promises four years back, but now they have also accepted that they were mere ‘jumlas’. They have accepted now that they were not able to give ample electricity to the state. I would like to remind the BJP government that soon elections will be all over the state in 2022, then they should kindly provide electricity to the entire state for 24 hours. Now the people of the state will not fight in the name of religion and caste, people are aware of the truth,” said Mishra.
Abdullah Azam, son of SP MP Azam Khan, had won from Rampur’s Swar assembly seat but his membership was cancelled by the Allahabad High Court due to discrepancy in his birth certificate. At the same time, the Malhani seat of Jaunpur came into existence in 2012. This seat has been held twice and has been won by the Samajwadi Party. This seat got vacant after the death of SP MLA Parasnath Yadav.
The six seats which were held by BJP include Bangarmau assembly seat in Unnao which got vacant after Kuldeep Singh Sengar was sentenced to life imprisonment in a rape case. The Tundla assembly seat in Firozabad got vacant after SP Singh Baghel became Member of the Parliament. Deoria assembly seat got vacant after the death of Janmejaya Singh, Naogaon Sadat assembly seat of Amroha after the death of Chetan Chauhan, Ghatampur assembly seat in Kanpur after the death of Kamlarani Varun and Bulandshahr assembly seat got vacant after the death of Virendra Singh Sirohi.
