Akhilesh Yadav mocks Yogi Adityanath for fighting from Gorakhpur in UP elections

Hours after the Bharatiya Janata Party unveiled its first list for the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday took a jibe at his successor CM Yogi Adityanath who has been named the candidate from Gorakhpur. Taking to his Twitter handle, Yadav underlined how there was confusion with regard to CM Yogi Adityanath fighting the elections from Mathura first, and Ayodhya thereafter, before there was a settlement on his bastion Gorakhpur. 

"Before the public could, his party has sent him back home. This is not a ticket for the elections, but a return ticket," he said in a post written in Hindi on Twitter. The first list consists of 105 candidates in total, which also has the Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya. 

Yogi Ji had said 'I will contest from any seat that party asks me to'

There were speculations doing the rounds that CM Yogi had been adamant about contesting from Gorakhpur instead of starting over from a fresh constituency. Putting an end to the speculations, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said, "Yogiji said 'I will contest from any seat party asks me to'... This was the party's decision. The decision has been made after much deliberation... the final decision (was taken) by the top leadership of the party." 

Polling in Gorakhpur is scheduled to take place on March 3 - the sixth phase. It is pertinent to mention here that CM Yogi has been voted to the Lok Sabha for five consecutive terms, till 2017 from Gorakhpur. 

After the announcement, CM Yogi in a conversation with the media said, "I am thankful to PM Modi, BJP chief JP Nadda, (and the) Central Parliamentary Committee for fielding me from Gorakhpur. BJP works on the model of 'sabka saath, sabka vikas'... BJP will form the government with full majority." 

In the list released, of the 105 seats, 83 had come out victorious in 2017. The winning MLAs from 63 of these seats have been retained, with the remaining 20 new faces. Candidates for the other 296 seats in UP's 403-member Assembly will be announced later.

Uttar Pradesh will vote in seven phases, between February 10 and March 7. The results will be counted on March 10.

Image: PTI