The outcome of the recent Assembly bypoll in Uttarakhand's Bageshwar has led to some tension in the relationship between the two INDIA allies, the Congress and the Samajwadi Party (SP), in neighbouring Uttar Pradesh. The Congress's UP unit has blamed the SP for the loss of its Bageshwar candidate to the BJP in a close fight, charging the latter with not following the “gathbandhan (alliance) dharma” in contrast to its gesture in the case of the Ghosi bypoll in UP. In the Bagheshwar by-election, the ruling BJP managed to retain the seat, with its candidate Parwati Dass defeating the Congress's nominee Basant Kumar by 2,405 votes. While Parwati secured 33,247 votes, Basant garnered 30,842 votes. Despite being a marginal player in Uttarakhand politics, the SP fielded its candidate Bhagwati Prasad in the Bageshwar fray, who could secure just 637 votes. However, the Congress offered support to its INDIA ally and refrained from fielding the party's candidate in the Ghosi bypoll which saw SP candidate Sudhakar Singh trouncing the BJP's heavyweight OBC leader Dara Singh Chauhan by 42,759 votes. In the wake of these bypoll results, UP Congress chief Ajay Rai blamed the SP for damaging the Congress candidate's prospects in Bageshwar by nominating its candidate there. Speaking to The Indian Express, Rai said following the coalition dharma he had conveyed his party's support to the SP in Ghosi even before SP national president Akhilesh Yadav asked for it. “These were the first bypolls after INDIA alliance was formed. We (Congress) acted with a big heart and even before their (SP) asking for support we offered it to them on paper as well as on the ground. The idea was to ally together to defeat the BJP and we were successful in Ghosi,” said Rai. He claimed that it was not that the Congress did not have a suitable candidate for the Ghosi bypoll. He said the Congress's Raj Mangal Yadav had garnered a significant chunk of votes against the BJP's Fagu Chauhan in the seat in the previous election, but the party still decided to not name its candidate in the bypoll for the sake of its INDIA ally. “We not only offered support in writing to Samajwadi Party candidate in Ghosi but Raj Mangal and other leaders did door-to-door campaigning for our alliance candidate. Even family members of late Kalpnath Rai (Congress leader) campaigned in favour of SP candidate,” said Rai. In the Bageshwar bypoll though, Rai said, the SP queered the pitch of the Congress by fielding its nominee, which led to the grand old party's defeat with a narrow margin. In a message to the SP leadership, he said, “Par ek haath se taali bajegi nahi” (but it will not be possible to clap with one hand). On its part, the SP has maintained that while they asked for support in Ghosi, the Congress “never did so as per rajnaitik shishtachar (political decorum)”. Asked about the Congress's charge over its Bageshwar bypoll loss, SP national spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said, “INDIA alliance is very much intact but there has not been any seat-sharing discussion yet. In this scenario, there is a basic political decorum, which is followed. Our national president wrote a letter to them (Congress leadership) seeking support (in Ghosi). We even spoke to them over phone seeking support but they never asked for it (in Bageshwar),” Chaudhary told The Indian Express. “Rajnaitik shishtachar hota hai.. Humnein baat ki, woh baat karte rashtriya adhyaksha ji se (as per political decorum the Congress leadership should have spoken with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav),” said Chaudhary. He also said that even after the SP fielded its candidate in the Bageshwar bypoll, the Congress camp did not ask the party to withdraw his name. “We wrote to and spoke with them (Congress) for Ghosi. For Bageshwar, neither did they talk to us nor did they ask to withdraw our candidate. So in case where seats have not yet been decided in alliance, it is wrong to blame and make allegations later on,” said Chaudhary. Observers say by indulging in such heated exchange over the bypoll results both the Congress and the SP were trying to strengthen their respective bargaining positions with regard to the Opposition grouping's UP seat-sharing for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The INDIA bloc's coordination committee, at its first meeting Wednesday, decided to kickstart the process of electoral seat-sharing in the states without any uniform formula. The Uttarakhand polls have been a two-party affair involving the BJP and the Congress. In the multi-party landscape of UP, however, the SP has been one of the leading players with the Congress continuing to be on its margins.
