LUCKNOW: Bahujan Samaj Party finally released its first list of 16 candidates in Uttar Pradesh for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls on Sunday. The party is, apparently, set to upset the apple cart of opposition bloc in Muslim dominated segments as seven of the 16 candidates announced for the seats of western UP are Muslims.Of the 16 candidates, the fate of eight will be decided in the first phase on April 19, five in the second phase on April 26, two in the third phase on May 7 and one (Shahjahanpur- SC) in the fourth phase on May 13.The BSP, which is going alone in this Lok Sabah elections unlike 2019 when it was in grand alliance with Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party, has replaced Fazlur Rehman, the sitting BSP MP from Saharanpur, with Majid Ali owing to the strong anti-incumbency sentiment against the sitting MP.Shripal Singh has been chosen to represent the party in Kairana. In 2019, BSP had not fielded the candidate on Kairana seat which had gone to the SP in alliance. Similarly, BSP had not contested Muzaffarnagar in 2019 as per the alliance seat arrangement. This time it has given ticket to Dara Singh Prajapati from Muzaffarnagar to take on SP’s Harendra Mallik who is a former MLA and BJP’s sitting MP Sanjeev Balyan, a minister in Modi cabinet.The party has fielded Vijendra Singh from Bijnor, Surendra Pal Singh from Nagina (SC) shifting Girish Chandra Jatav, the sitting BSP MP from Nagina to Bualndshahr, another reserved seat. Mohammad Irfan Saifi has been fielded from Moradabad, which has around 47 per cent Muslim population leading to the division of minority votes denting the prospects of SP candidate under INDI Alliance. In 2019, Moradabad seat was won by Dr ST Hassan of SP.However, Akhilesh Yadav is yet to finalise the candidate for Moradabad.
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