Will review Kashi performance ahead of ’27 assembly polls: BJP

Varanasi: Of 14 Lok Sabha seats falling under the limits of its Kashi region unit, Bharatiya Janata Party could win only Varanasi, Bhadohi and Phoolpur, while its alliance partner Apna Dal (Sonelal) secured the Mirzapur seat. Lok Sabha seats in neighbouring districts Azamgarh, Ballia and Mau, which fall under Goraksh regional unit of the party, BJP-led NDA struggled badly. While SP performed outstandingly and won most of the seats in this region of east UP, Bahujan Samaj Party too took its tally of votes to 1 lakh and above on most of the seats, which upset BJP’s victory trail.On relatively poor performance of the party in the region, BJP Kashi region unit president Dilip Singh Patel said, “The party would review constituency-wise performance to know the reason for defeat of the party and alliance candidates. Once this exercise was complete, strategy to tackle the challenges faced in the election would be finalised ahead of the 2027 assembly polls,” he added.On the other hand, SP supporters like Umakanth Yadav said party chief Akhilesh Yadav’s strategy of uniting PDA (pichhda, dalit, alpsankhyak) worked effectively as people’s attention was drawn to issues not addressed by BJP during the campaign, like inflation, unemployment, Agniveer, paper leak. SP succeeded in keeping the voters including minority members of INDIA bloc united, so when traditional voters of BSP shifted back to it, no harm was caused to INDIA bloc, they said, mentioning that return of BSP voters into its fold caused losses to BJP. The claims regarding BSP playing spoilsport for BJP were evident in the vote tally of the candidate. Except Varanasi, where BSP’s Atahar Jamal Lari could win only 33,766 votes, candidates of the party performed well on almost all neighbouring seats. In Bhadohi, BSP’s Harishankar bagged 1,54,582 vote making contest for BJP’s Vinod Kumar Bind (4,58,728) tough against AITC Laliteshpati Tripathi (4,14,030). Similar role was played in Mirzapur by BSP’s Manish Kumar with 1,43,724 votes. After trailing in several rounds, AD(S)’s Anupriya Patel won 4,68,869 to defeat SP’s Ramesh Chand Bind (4,30,900) in a close contest.In Lalganj (Reserved) seat, BSP’s Indu Chaudhari fetched 2,10,044 votes, blocking chances of BJP’s Neelam Sonkar (3,24,586) who lost to SP’s Daroga Prasad Saroj (4,39,343). In another reserved Machhlishehr seat BSP’s Kripa Shankar Saroj secured 1,56,806 to secure the third place, while SP’s Priya Saroj (4,49,302) defeated BJP’s B P Saroj (4,14,455) in a close contest. After MLC Shah Alam alias Guddu Jamali left BSP and joined SP, all eyes were on BSP candidate Mashhod Sabeeha Ansari to see whether he will succeed in securing party base in Azamgarh. Ansari won 1,79,839 votes in a contest won by SP’s Dharmendra Yadav (5,08,239), defeating BJP’s Dinesh Lal Yadav Nirahua (3,47,204).Ghazipur had also been drawing attention as the election was taking place after death of gangster and ex-MP Mukhtar Ansari in Banda jail in Mar. His brother Afzal Ansari, who is sitting MP on BSP ticket and contested this election as SP candidate won 5,37,784 to defeat BJP’s Prasanath Rai (4,13,518). BSP’s Umesh Kumar Singh secured 1,64,601.In Ghosi, BSP’s Balkrishna Chauhan scored 1,99,503 votes to stay on the third place while SP’s Rajeev Rai (4,79,959) defeated SBSP’s Arvind Rajbhar (3,19,035) easily. BSP’s Satyendra Kumar Maurya attracting 1,59,903 votes made it easy for SP’s Virendra Singh (4,74,476) to win Chandauli seat, defeating BJP’s Mahendra Nath Pandey (4,52,911)In Ballia, SP’s Sanatan Pandey (3,62,739) defeated BJP’s Neeraj Shekhar (3,23,357) by a margin that was less than BSP’s Lallan Singh Yadav’s score of 67,020 votes.