Calculated move by SP: Shakya appointed Mainpuri dist chief ahead of bypolls in west UP

LUCKNOW In what is being interpreted as a strategic caste calculation move by the Samajwadi Party (SP) ahead of the crucial Mainpuri parliamentary bypolls, the party on Wednesday appointed former UP minister Alok Shakya as the district president.

SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, on July 3 this year, had dissolved the national, state and district outfits of the party, including the youth and the women’s wings. The step was taken to reorganise the party for the 2024 LS polls.

Since then, all the district units were technically headless.

However, given the Mainpuri bypoll that’s prestigious for the SP as it is considered a legacy of late SP founder Mulayam Singh Yadav, the party is paying special attention to it. It appointed Shakya as the district president to organise and rev up the party’s district unit for the bypolls.

While the SP’s move to appoint the district president ahead of the bypolls is seen as a step in the right direction, insiders say appointing Shakya on the post is a strategic caste arithmetic deployed by the party.

Shakyas are the second dominant caste in the Mainpuri Lok Sabha constituency after the Yadavs. Of the total 17.4 lakh electorate in Mainpuri LS, there are an estimated 7 lakh Yadavs while Shakyas are roughly 3 lakh.

“It is a good move by the SP to consolidate Shakyas along with Yadavs --these two are the most dominant castes in the Mainpuri LS constituency,” said Subhash Tripathi, a senior journalist based in Etawah.

Alok Shakya is a three-time former MLA from the Bhogaon assembly segment in Mainpuri LS constituency. Another factor behind Shakya’s selection as the district president is that he was close to Mulayam Singh Yadav and a minister in his cabinet.

The SP also believes that Shakya, at the helm of affairs in Mainpuri, would help it in case the BJP fields any Shakya candidate against SP’s probable Yadav candidate. None of the parties have declared a candidate for the bypolls scheduled on December 5, but the SP most certainly would field a Yadav candidate. The BJP had fielded a Shakya candidate -- Prem Singh Shakya --against Mulayam in the 2019 LS polls. In 2019, Mulayam Singh Yadav won the seat by securing 5,24,926 votes while BJP candidate Prem Singh Shakya stood second with 4,30,537 votes.

The SP had faced defeat and embarrassment when early this year, it lost its citadels, Azamgarh and Rampur Lok Sabha constituencies, to the BJP in the bypolls.