Uncertainty continues to prevail over the ruling BJP’s ticket for the Pilibhit Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh, which is currently represented by Varun Gandhi.
Pilibhit is the most high-profile among eight seats in the state that will go to the polls in the first phase on April 19, for which the nomination process began Wednesday.
Speculation is rife that the BJP might not field Varun this time, in which case he may contest the election from Pilibhit as an Independent candidate.
The SP camp had earlier sent out signals that it might consider giving Varun ticket if the BJP denied it to him, with party chief Akhilesh Yadav saying, “Our organisation would decide what decision is to be taken about it.”
However, late on Wednesday night, releasing its sixth list of another six candidates, the SP named ex-minister Bhagwat Saran Gangwar as its nominee from the Pilibhit seat.
Former Union minister Maneka Gandhi, Varun’s mother, had contested from Pilibhit successfully as a Janata Dal candidate in 1989. She lost the seat in 1991, but wrested it back in 1996, again on the Janata Dal ticket.
Maneka went on to win the seat as an Independent in 1998 and 1999. She won the seat on the BJP ticket in 2004.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, however, Maneka left the seat for Varun, who won it by a margin of over two lakhs.
Maneka returned to fight from Pilibhit in 2014, winning it by about three lakh votes. In 2019, Varun contested from the seat again as the BJP nominee, defeating SP candidate Hemraj Verma by nearly 2.5 lakh votes.
The other seven UP seats that will go to the polls in the first phase are: Saharanpur, Kairana, Muzaffarnagar, Bijnor, Nagina, Moradabad and Rampur. Of them, in 2019 the BJP won three seats – Pilibhit, Kairana and Muzaffarnagar. The BSP got three seats – Saharanpur, Nagina and Bijnore – while the SP won the Moradabad and Rampur seats. However, in the bypolls held subsequently, the BJP won Rampur.
Saharanpur is the only one among the first phase seats in UP that the SP has allotted to the Congress under their seat-sharing agreement.
Congress sources say that Imran Masood is a probable party candidate from Saharanpur. The BSP has not officially declared its candidates but has indicated that Majid Ali, a former zila panchayat chairman, is likely to be its nominee here. The seat was won by BSP leader Hazi Fazrul Rehman in 2019, when he had defeated the BJP’s Raghav Lakhan Pal by about 20,000 votes.
In Rampur, the BJP and the SP have not declared their candidates so far. In 2019, SP stalwart Azam Khan had won
the seat, but he was disqualified after being convicted in a hate speech case. The BJP’s Ghanshyam Singh Lodhi won the seat in the 2022 bypoll.
Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Azad has indicated his preference to contest from the Nagina seat. It was earlier speculated that he might contest the seat in alliance with the SP. However, the SP has fielded Manoj Kumar from the constituency, putting such buzz to rest. The BJP has fielded sitting Nehtaur MLA Om Kumar from this seat. However, the BSP, which won here in 2019, has not nominated its candidate amid indications that it might shift its sitting MP Girish Chandra this time.
In Kairana, the BJP has again fielded sitting MP Pradeep Chaudhary. The SP has declared Iqra Hassan as its candidate. The BSP has indicated that it might field former minister Dharam Singh Saini from the seat.
In Muzaffarnagar, the BJP has repeated two-term sitting MP Sajeev Balyan, while the SP has nominated Harendra Singh Malik. The BSP has fielded Dara Singh from the seat.
In Bijnore, the BSP’s Malook Nagar had trounced the BJP’s Bharatendra Singh by about 70,000 votes in 2019. This time round, the BJP has given the seat to the RLD as part of their alliance, which has fielded Chandan Chauhan there. The SP has nominated Yashvir Singh, while the BSP may field Jat leader Chaudhary Vijendra Singh, who recently switched to the party from the RLD.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha polls Varun Gandhi had won the Pilibhit seat by a margin of over 2 lakh votes. (Express Archives) 
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