Akhilesh’s new plan: Meeting in Bengal, rhythm in Amethi… Will cycle ride in Congress fort in third front exercise?

After the tussle between Sonia and Mulayam over the issue of becoming PM in 1999, both the parties fielded candidates against the top leaders in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections. After this, except for a few occasions in UP, for almost a decade and a half, there was an agreement between the Gandhi family and the Saifai family not to field candidates against each other.
Amethi’s cylinder MP… Akhilesh Yadav gave a new name while taunting Smriti Irani over price rise
Akhilesh wants to move ahead of this rut. He said in Azamgarh that the SP alliance will contest all the 80 seats in UP in the Lok Sabha. Now after Amethi tour on Monday, he said, ‘SP takes a pledge to eradicate poverty of Amethi’.

Why so harsh on Congress?
SP has not got any electoral advantage of friendship with Congress so far. In the national politics, the ‘side effects’ of the Congress also come into the account of the SP when it competes with the BJP along with the Congress. The stage is also being set for the Third Front for the 2024 elections, on which Akhilesh is also riding.

Leader of Opposition Akhilesh Yadav chose to remain absent during Leader of the House Yogi Adityanath’s reply on the budget in the Assembly to attend Stalin’s birthday on March 1. Third Front has equal distance from Congress-BJP. Therefore, Akhilesh also does not want to have any ‘illusion’.

Why are you making strategy in Bengal?
After about 10 years, a two-day meeting of the National Executive of SP will be held in Kolkata again from March 18. In Bengal, where SP has no land, the exercise of deciding the future strategy is being considered as Mulayam’s tradition and an attempt to deepen friendship with Mamta Banerjee. Mulayam called the party’s working committee five times in Kolkata.

At the same time, Mamta had come to UP in 2022 to campaign for SP. There is talk of Mamta Banerjee coming in the upcoming meeting of SP. Akhilesh is trying to strengthen this friendship further in the exercise of national expansion of the party and his stature.

what did akhilesh say
I was deeply saddened to see the plight of poor women in Amethi. VIPs have always won and lost here, yet the condition is like this here, so what to say about the rest of the state. Next time Amethi will not elect big people but people with big heart. SP takes a pledge to eradicate poverty of Amethi.

friendly fight like this

SP-

• SP did not fight in Amethi against Sonia Gandhi in 1999 and Rahul from 2004 to 2019
• From 2009-2019, Sonia had SP’s walkover in Rae Bareli

Congress-

• Congress did not contest against Mulayam, Tej Pratap, Dimple in Mainpuri from 2009 to 2022, however, challenged Mulayam from Azamgarh in 2014.
• Between 2009 and 2019, the Congress did not field a candidate against either Akhilesh or Dimple from Kannauj. However, in 2009, Dimple Yadav was defeated by Congress’s Raj Babbar in the Firozabad by-election.
• Azamgarh against Akhilesh in 2019, Firozabad against Akshay Yadav. Walkover for Akhilesh-Shivpal in 2022 as well.