Yadav family members in focus in third phase of Lok Sabha polls in UP

Lucknow, May 6 (PTI) Ten parliamentary constituencies of Uttar Pradesh will go to polls in the third phase of Lok Sabha elections on Tuesday, with all eyes on Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav’s family members.

While Dimple Yadav is aiming to retain the Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat, which she won in the bypolls following the demise of her father-in-law Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akshaya Yadav, son of Ram Gopal Yadav, the national principal general secretary of SP, will try to reclaim the Firozabad seat, which he had won in 2014.

Aditya Yadav, the son of SP national general secretary Shivpal Yadav, is making his electoral debut from the Budaun Lok Sabha seat, which was represented by his cousin Dharmendra Yadav in 2014.

Besides the Yadav family members, polling will be held to seal the fate of Union Minister SP Singh Baghel, Uttar Pradesh’s Tourism Minister Jayveer Singh, Minister of State for Revenue Anoop Pradhan Balmiki.

Baghel, Jayveer Singh, and Balmiki are contesting from Agra (SC), Mainpuri, and Hathras (SC) Lok Sabha seats respectively.

Rajveer Singh, son of former Uttar Pradesh chief minister and BJP stalwart Kalyan Singh, is looking to score a hat-trick from the Etah parliamentary constituency, which was also represented in 2009 by Kalyan Singh as a candidate of the Jan Kranti Party.

In Bareilly, the main contest has narrowed down to the BJP’s Chhatrapal Singh Gangwar and SP’s Praveen Singh Aron, after the nomination paper of the BSP candidate Master Chhotey Lal Gangwar was rejected.

In the third phase, the BJP has given tickets to five new faces — Chhatrapal Gangwar from Bareilly, Durvijay Singh Shakya from Budaun, Anoop Pradhan Balmiki from Hathras-SC, Vishwadeep Singh from Firozabad, and Jayveer Singh from Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat.

The first four replaced Santosh Gangwar, Sanghamitra Maurya, Rajveer Singh Diler, and Chandrasen Jadaun. Jayveer Singh is the sole candidate in this phase who replaced a losing candidate from BJP.

The saffron party retained the winning candidates from Etah, Agra (SC), Aonla, and Fatehpur Sikri. It also gave a ticket to Parameshwar Lal Saini from Sambhal Lok Sabha seat.

The Congress has fielded one candidate — Ramnath Singh Sikarwar from Fatehpur Sikri, while its INDIA bloc ally, the Samajwadi Party, has fielded candidates in the remaining nine seats in this phase.

Sambhal, Hathras (SC), Agra (SC), Fatehpur Sikri, Firozabad, Mainpuri, Etah, Budaun, Aonla and Bareilly are the constituencies where polling will be conducted.

Over 1.88 crore voters are eligible to decide the fate of 100 candidates in this phase.