Dimple Yadav to contest bypoll to Mainpuri seat

The Samajwadi Party (SP) on Thursday fielded Dimple Yadav, wife of party chief Akhilesh Yadav, as its candidate for the Mainpuri Lok Sabha bypoll on December 5.

The seat fell vacant after the death of party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on October 10.

“The party declares Dimple Yadav as candidate for Mainpuri bypoll,” the party announced on Twitter. The bypoll result will be declared on December 8.

Dimple was elected unopposed to the Lok Sabha from Kannauj constituency in 2012 after Akhilesh became the chief minister and resigned from the seat to enter the Uttar Pradesh legislative council.

She again won the seat in the 2014 Lok Sabha election but lost it to BJP candidate Subrat Pathak in 2019.

The SP has won the Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat nine times, including twice in bypolls.

Since 2004, the seat has been with the Yadav family.

Mulayam alone won the seat five times, including in 2019, when he defeated his nearest rival, BJP’s Prem Singh Shakya. While Mulayam secured 524,926 votes, Prem Singh got only 30,0537 votes.

After Mulayam’s demise last month, the names of Mainpuri MP Tej Pratap Singh Yadav, Akhilesh’s cousin Dharmendra Yadav and Dimple were doing the rounds as SP’s probable candidate from the seat.

It is for the first time Dimple is contesting from the seat. If she wins, she will be the first woman MP of Mainpuri.

Initially, Tej Pratap, Mulayam’s grandnephew and former Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad’s son-in-law, was believed to be the front-runner in the poll.

Tej Pratap had won the 2014 Mainpuri Lok Sabha bypoll that was held after Mulayam decided to vacate the seat and retain Azamgarh.

Dharmendra, a former Badaun MP, was defeated by the BJP in the Azamgarh Lok Sabha bypoll in June this year. The bypoll was necessitated after Akhilesh vacated the seat to retain Karhal assembly seat.

The SP was also defeated by the BJP in the Rampur Lok Sabha bypoll in June.

On Wednesday, the SP had appointed former state minister Alok Shakya as its Mainpuri district president.

The appointment is being seen as a strategic move ahead of the election as the Shakyas are the second most dominant caste, after the Yadavs, in the Mainpuri Lok Sabha constituency. While there are roughly 700,000 Yadavs, there are around 300,000 Shakyas in the region.

The BJP or its forerunner, Jana Singh, could not win the seat since 1952.

On Dimple’s candidature, the BJP said the SP cannot come out of dynastic politics.

“What else could you expect from the SP, which only gives preference to its family. The people of Mainpuri will this time elect a BJP MP,” BJP spokesperson Rakesh Tripathi said. Is BJP considering not contesting the election? Seems like some tv report…

SP leader and former MLC Rajpal Kashyap said the party will win by a record margin. “The people of Mainpuri have always supported the SP. After the death of Netaji (as Mulayam was popularly known), the people will once again support the party and give us a chance to serve them,” he said.

Shivpal Yadav’s Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia (PSPL) said a final decision on this seat will be taken by the party leadership.

Akhiklesh’s Karhal assembly seat is part of Mainpuri Lok Sabha constituency and so is Jaswant Nagar represented by Shivpal Yadav.

Congress spokesperson Ashok Singh said that it was the SP patriarch’s seat and “we welcome their decision”.

Asked whether the Congress will contest on the seat or not, Singh said: “We are yet to decide. We still have time.”