UP Assembly Bypolls: BJP vs SP showdown for 9 seats as Congress opts out. Find what’s at stake in the crucial contest

The Congress party has announced that it will not field candidates in the nine assembly seats of Uttar Pradesh, where the by polls are being held on November 13. The grand old party said it would, however, support the candidates fielded by its INDIA bloc partner, the Samajwadi Party.

With Congress out, the stage is set for a direct contest between Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav. The candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP) are now face to face in these crucial bypolls, though other players like the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Azad Samaj Party are also in the fray.

The bypolls assume significance since they are being held months after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, in which the INDIA bloc bagged 43 of the 80 parliamentary seats. The SP won 37 seats, while the Congress won 6. The National Democratic Alliance's (NDA) numbers fell drastically from 66 seats in 2019 to just 36 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Of these, the BJP won 33 seats.

Prestige battle for Yogi, litmus test for Akhilesh

So, the bypolls will test whether the INDIA bloc, SP to be precise, will continue its 2024 general election momentum. It will also be a prestige battle for Yogi Adityanath after the Lok Sabha results and ahead of the2027 assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.

“The bypolls will tell us whether or not the BJP’s fortunes have actually come down in UP. Or was the 2024 election just a phase and that the Modi-Yogi remains a winning combination,” said a political analyst.

Eight of the nine assembly seats going for bypolls fell vacant after the MLAs were elected to Lok Sabha in 2024 polls.

In the 2022 UP assembly elections, the SP won four of these seats—Sisamau, Katehari, Karhal, and Kundarki. The BJP also bagged four—Phulpur, Ghaziabad, Majhawan, and Khair. The ninth seat, Meerapur, was won by the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), which was then allied with the SP. The RLD is now an NDA partner.

Here is a detail about the fights in these 9 seats

Karhal: Akhilesh Yadav’s cousin and former MP Tej Pratap Yadav is contesting as SP candidate from the family stronghold in Mainpuri. The BJP has fielded Anujesh Yadav as its candidate. Akhilesh Yadav won the Karhal assembly seat in 2022. The bypoll was necessitated after Akhilesh won Lok Sabha election from Kannauj in 2024.

Ghaziabad: The BJP has given the ticket to Sanjeev Sharma, from Ghaziabad seat, neighbouring Delhi. Ghaziabad is one of the five assembly seats in Ghaziabad district. The SP has fielded Singh Raj Jatav from here. BJP’s Atul Garg won the seat in 2022. Garg won Lok Sabha polls 2024 from Ghaziabad.

Sisamau: The SP has fielded Naseem Solanki from Sisamau seat in Kanpur Nagar. She is the wife of disqualified SP MLA Irfan Solanki, who had won the seat in 2022.

The seat fell vacant after Solanki was disqualified post his conviction in a criminal case. The BJP has fielded Suresh Awasthi from the seat.

Phulpur: The SP has fielded Mohd Mustafa Siddiqui from Phulpur seat that was won by BJP’s Praveen Patel had in the 2022 assembly polls. Patel is now Lok Sabha MP from Phulphur. The BJP has fielded former Karchana MLA Deepak Patel from Phulphur in bypolls.

Katehri: Shobhawati Verma is the SP candidate from Katehri seat in Ambedkarnagar. She is the wife of SP MP from Ambedkarnagar Lalji Verma, who won the Katehri assembly seat in 2022. The BJP has fielded Dharmraj Nishad, a three-time former MLA and former minister in the BSP government who joined the BJP two years ago

Kundarki: The SP has fielded former MLA Haji Mohd Rizwan here. The BJP has once again fielded Ramveer Thakur from Kundarki seat in Moradabad . Thakur lost the seat twice in the past

Majhawan: Suchismita Maurya is the BJP candidate from the Majhawan seat in Mirzapur. The SP has fielded Jyoti Bind. daughter of three-time former Majhawan MLA and former Bhadohi MP Ramesh Bind.

Khair: The SP has announced Dr Charu Kain as its candidate from Khair seat in Aligarh. Kain lost from this seat as BSP candidate in 2022. The BJP has fielded Surendra Diler, the son of former MP Rajveer Diler from here

Meerapur: The SP has announced Sumbul Rana as its candidate from Meerapur seat in Muzaffarnagar. She is the daughter-in-law of former Muzaffarnagar MP Kadir Rana and daughter of BSP leader Munkad Ali. BJP ally, RLD has fielded Mithilesh Pal as the candidate from here.