The opposition has been contesting the elections in Gorakhpur city seat with impunity. For the last three decades, none of the leaders of SP, Congress, BSP did political work by concentrating on this seat, nor made it an area of struggle. In every election, new candidates kept coming from these parties and kept disappearing after the elections. Due to this the BJP got stronger here.
Gorakhpur: The seat of Gorakhpur city is now going to become the most talked about seat of the state in the entire election. After the announcement of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to contest the elections, all the opposition parties are trying to put up a powerful face from here. The contest on this seat has become interesting due to the entry of Chandrashekhar Ravana from the Azad Samaj Party.
The BJP has been winning the Gorakhpur city seat continuously since 1989. In eight elections held since 1989, only BJP candidates have emerged victorious.
In 1989, Shiv Pratap Shukla of BJP defeated Sunil Shastri, son of former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, Congress candidate. Sunil Shastri won the elections from Gorakhpur seat in 1980 and 1985 and was a minister in the state government. Shiv Pratap Shukla won the elections in 1989 and then won elections in 1991, 1993 and 1996 as well. He was also a minister twice in the BJP government.
Before the 2002 elections, he had a fight with Yogi Adityanath. Yogi Adityanath put pressure on BJP not to give ticket to Shiv Pratap Shukla. Despite Yogi’s displeasure, BJP made Shiv Pratap Shukla its candidate. Shiv Pratap Shukla was in the politics of Gorakhpur at that time.
By then Yogi Adityanath had become a two-time MP from the BJP. He won the 1999 Lok Sabha elections by a narrow margin from SP candidate Jamuna Nishad. Till then he had not formed Hindu Yuva Vahini. Yogi supporters were active in the Hindu Mahasabha and were doing radical Hindutva politics.
In 2002, Yogi Adityanath from the Hindu Mahasabha against Shivpratap Shukla, Dr. Radha Mohan Das Aggarwal contested the election. Dr. Agarwal was a well-known pediatrician of Gorakhpur. He was associated with the RSS for a long time and was active in many affiliated organizations of the Sangh.
Dr. Agarwal won this election by a huge margin of 18 thousand. Shiv Pratap Shukla moved to the third position and got 14,509 votes. After this Shiv Pratap Shukla went marginalized in BJP politics.
After Narendra Modi became the Prime Minister, his days again returned. He was made a member of the Rajya Sabha in the year 2016 and he also became a minister in the Modi-One government. It is Shiv Pratap Shukla who has been made the head of a committee of BJP to remove the displeasure of Brahmins in this election.
After defeating the BJP candidate in the 2002 elections, Yogi Adityanath formed the Hindu Yuva Vahini and started a new chapter of communal politics with the help of it, increasing his influence not only in Gorakhpur but also in the surrounding districts. He has fielded candidates against the BJP in the assembly elections several times. In every election, there was a situation of confrontation with the BJP organization and Yogi.
The conflict ended in 2012, when the BJP organization accepted Yogi’s political power and tickets were given to his favorite candidates.
Dr. Radha Mohan Das Agarwal won three more elections held after the year 2002- 2007, 2012 and 2017. His margin of victory kept increasing in every election. After the new delimitation in the year 2012, the name of Gorakhpur Vidhan Sabha was changed to Gorakhpur city.
After the new delimitation, the city of Gorakhpur became more favorable for the BJP as a large part of the minority and backward castes – especially the Nishad community – moved to the Gorakhpur Rural Assembly.
The reason for the increase in the victory margin of BJP in this seat was not only the new delimitation, Dr. Radha Mohan Das Aggarwal’s increased popularity due to taking everyone along, maintaining direct and easy contact with the voters.
He also kept a distance from the fanatical communal politics of Yogi Adityanath and made his own image in two decades. During this period, no BJP MLA could build his independent image like Dr. Radha Mohan Agarwal. Because of creating an independent image, it was being publicized in Gorakhpur that Dr. Radha Mohan Das Aggarwal’s Yogi is not related to Adityanath.
Despite being a senior MLA in the Yogi government, Dr. The publicity was fueled by several BJP MLAs, including BJP MP Ravi Kishan, publicly targeting Agarwal for not making Agarwal a minister and the transfer of an engineer last year, but those who know the BJP and Yogi Adityanath well. There is a certain kind of understanding between the two leaders, despite their different approach and approach to politics.
For the last two years, there was a discussion in Gorakhpur that Yogi Adityanath can contest the 2022 assembly elections from Gorakhpur city. Along with this, it was also discussed that if Yogi Adityanath will contest from Gorakhpur city seat, then Dr. What will be Agarwal’s stand?
Meanwhile, the discussion of Yogi Adityanath contesting from Ayodhya intensified for the last few months. Frequent visits by the Chief Minister to Ayodhya, foundation stone-inauguration of development works there, meeting with booth level workers in Ayodhya by the Chief Minister’s OSD, meeting the saints and saints made this discussion serious and said that Yogi’s contesting from Ayodhya is certain. But on January 15, when the BJP released the first list, Yogi Adityanath’s name was for the Gorakhpur city seat.
There is still a debate going on regarding the decision of the BJP leadership not to contest the election of Yogi Adityanath from Ayodhya, what could be the reason for this?
It is understood that this decision was taken by the top leadership of BJP because Yogi Adityanath’s claim to the throne of Delhi would have been strengthened if he contested from Ayodhya, so he was sent to Gorakhpur.
Before the announcement of Yogi Adityanath to contest from Gorakhpur city seat, Dr. Agarwal was making contact with voters through social media. On the day the ticket was announced, his Facebook Live program was scheduled on that night. After the announcement he postponed it. In the media, he only said that I am a worker of BJP. This decision of the party is welcome.
Many speculations are also being made about his brief statement. In a press conference by SP President Akhilesh Yadav, Dr. Offering tickets in the name of Aggarwal gave impetus to these discussions that Dr. Agarwal will not take any other step.
There have also been reports in the media to the effect that Dr. Agarwal may revolt but those who know him well know that he will not take any such step.
On social media Dr. There is a constant discussion about Agarwal’s next step and his silence. A post is being pushed a lot on social media in which it is written that ‘Dr. The opportunity has come for Agarwal to get loan from the Guru loan.
After Yogi Adityanath’s announcement to contest from Gorakhpur city, it is being discussed that who will be fielded by the opposition parties against him?
On Thursday, Bhim Army Chief Chandrashekhar Ravana announced to contest from Gorakhpur. This made the election temperature of Gorakhpur city even hotter.
Chandrashekhar’s desire to contest from Gorakhpur is old. When the Yogi government sent him to jail, he wanted to challenge Yogi Adityanath by contesting the 2018 Lok Sabha by-election on Gorakhpur seat from jail itself. His supporters also explored the possibility of contesting from Gorakhpur.
After not having an alliance with SP and Congress in this election, he has announced to contest from all 403 seats in the state. The election results may be something if he contests from Gorkhupar, but he will definitely put a strong siege of Yogi Adityanath. By contesting elections here, he and his party will get a lot of discussion, as well as they will be able to further strengthen the image of their fighting and fighting Dalit leader.
Many Dalit organizations in Gorakhpur are in touch with Chandrashekhar who can campaign for him, yet it is difficult to say how much real challenge he will be able to give to Yogi Adityanath in this seat which is favorable for the BJP in such a short span of time.
SP, BSP and Congress are also searching for such candidates who can give tough competition to Yogi Adityanath. The name of Sunil Shastri has been discussed by the Congress. The name of Sunil Singh, who was once very close to Yogi Adityanath and the state president of Hindu Yuva Vahini (Hiyuva), is also being discussed by the SP.
Sunil Singh had rebelled against Yogi Adityanath during the 2017 assembly elections. They were demanding to give tickets to many leaders of Hiyuva from BJP. He himself wanted to contest the election but Yogi Adityanath refused.
Sunil Singh and his associates were expelled from the Hindu Yuva Vahini due to the rebellion. These rebel leaders of Hindu Yuva Vahini had also contested elections on more than a dozen seats.
Sunil Singh was later arrested in a case and he also faced Rasuka. He remained in jail for a long time. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, he filed his nomination from the Gorakhpur parliamentary constituency but his nomination was cancelled. Then he had alleged that his nomination has been canceled at the behest of Yogi Adityanath. Later he joined SP.
He is preparing for election from Khalilabad seat of Sant Kabirnagar district but from there the sitting BJP MLA Jai Choubey has joined the SP. This has weakened Sunil Singh’s chances of contesting from there.
Sunil Singh also now wants to contest against Yogi Adityanath in Gorakhpur city seat. He has expressed his intention by writing several posts on his Facebook account. He has written that he will make this election the toughest election for Yogi Adityanath.
There is a discussion going on for the son or wife of the late Upendra Dutt Shukla, a senior BJP leader from SP, to contest the elections. On Thursday, Arvind Dutt Shukla, son of Upendra Dutt Shukla, Amit Dutt Shukla and wife Shubhavati Shukla joined the SP. It is expected that the candidature will be announced in a day or two.
Upendra Dutt Shukla was the regional president of BJP. He had contested the 2018 Lok Sabha by-election from BJP but Nishad Party President Dr. Sanjay had lost the election to Nishad’s son Praveen Nishad. He passed away last year.
Shukla’s family is sorry that after the death of his father, Yogi Adityanath did not come to his house to express condolences. The BJP also did not take the news of his family members.
The seat of Gorakhpur city is an upper caste majority seat. There is a sizeable number of Brahmin, Vaish, Kayastha voters who have traditionally been voting for the BJP. Among the backward classes, the people of Chauhan fraternity are the most. The BJP has a good hold in this category as well. There are 125 dalit settlements in the city assembly constituency. From there too BJP has been getting votes.
BSP could never get more than 25 thousand votes in this seat. He always had to be in third or fourth place.
The BSP got 14,124, 5,604, 23,891, 24,297 votes in this seat in 2002, 2007, 2012 and 2017 respectively. At the same time, SP got 20,382 votes in the year 2002, 27,323 in 2007 and 33,694 in 2012.
In the last election, Congress and SP’s joint candidate Rana Rahul Singh got 61,491 votes. The performance of Congress has been very poor in this seat. In the year 2002, the Congress candidate got 3,843, 3,556 votes in 2012, 11,171 votes in 2012.
In Gorakhpur city seat, the opposition parties have been contesting elections with impunity. For the last three decades, none of the leaders of SP, Congress, BSP did political work by concentrating on the Gorakhpur city seat. This seat was not made a zone of conflict.
Everyone kept believing that BJP cannot be defeated on this seat. In every election, new candidates kept coming from these parties and kept disappearing after the elections. This is the reason why BJP got stronger day by day here. Now when Yogi Adityanath himself is contesting from here, all the parties are going to contest the elections separately.
No common candidate is being fielded as was done in the 2018 Lok Sabha by-elections. In these circumstances, whether the opposition party should give candidates from outside or local, it will be very difficult to surround Yogi Adityanath here.
(The author is the editor of Gorakhpur Newsline website.)
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