Panchayat polls: Each party claims to have fared better than other

The elections were not contested on party symbols, but the BSP and the BJP had authorised party workers to contest in most of the zila panchayat wards. The SP had not authorised any party candidates and its workers contested on their own, many against one another.

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Congress Tuesday claimed that 81 of its candidates out of the total 1,562 that contested with party’s authorisation have won. BJP has said 536 of its workers who contested have won.

While BSP state headquarters did not cite any numbers, party general secretary Swami Prasad Maurya said they have won 50 per cent of total 3,112 wards. Maurya said they are still counting the number of wards the party has won.

However, according to figures cited by BSP coordinators and district functionaries, BSP workers have won as many as 725 wards, making it the front-runner. Most of the relatives of senior party leaders and party office-bearers managed to win.

BSP chief Mayawati has called a meeting of all senior party functionaries, MLAs, and district presidents on Thursday in an apparent move to energise the cadres who had been demoralised after the party’s failure to win any seats in Lok Sabha elections last year.

SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said they were still collecting details of party workers who had won the elections. He claimed that SP workers had won 80 per cent of the wards while other parties’ won the remaining 20 per cent.

“BSP has won only five per cent wards, and the BJP fared even worse than that,” he claimed.

BJP state president Laxmikant Bajpai said that SP and BSP had not declared any candidate in panchayat elections while theirs was the only political party that had contested election with its declared candidates. “Now Samajwadi Party and BSP are staking claims to the winner independent candidates. This is politically immoral,” he claimed.

On the issue of defeat of BJP candidate in Jayapur village adopted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Varanasi, Bajpai said that party two workers have been elected as block development committee (BDC) members in that village. BJP candidate in zila panchayat poll there secured 831 votes against total polled 1,700 votes while SP got only 55 votes, he claimed.

Congress questions counting process

Amethi: Congress leader and former UP minister Ameeta Singh Tuesday raised questions over the just concluded panchayat polls, alleging that there were discrepancies in the counting at a ward in Amethi.
“For hours an independent candidate for the district development committee post, Indrajit Yadav alias Jeete, was leading over Shambhu Nath Yadav from Ward 31 in Bhadar block. But in the last phase, the SP supported candidate, Shambhu Yadav, was elected and issued certificate of victory. “How did it happen?” she asked.  PTI