Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav filed his nomination from Kannauj Lok Sabha elections 2024. After filing his nomination papers, SP Supremo expressed gratitude to the people of the constituency and alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party has "deliberately stalled" the development of the region. It is to be noted Uttar Pradesh's Kannauj seat has sent him to Parliament thrice. The seat has also voted for his wife, Dimple Yadav, and Mulayam Singh Yadav, the late SP patriarch.
“I have filed my nomination papers. The sentiments of the party, leaders, workers, and everyone were that I should contest the election from here on behalf of the Samajwadi Party. I express my gratitude to everyone. I hope I will get blessings from here,” Yadav told reporters.
"The development was deliberately stalled by the BJP government because it was started by Samajwadi. BJP has done negative politics. BJP has time and again insulted people. I had come to serve the people of Kannauj earlier as well. The people of Kannauj have seen development happening," he added.
Notably, Yadav, also a former UP CM, had also won the Azamgarh seat in 2019 but quit after he was elected to the State Assembly from Karhal in 2022.
As per the report, speculations rife that the SP leader will return to the Lok Sabha battlefield had been doing the rounds.
Kannau has been a stronghold of the Samajwadi Party for a long till the BJP's Subrat Pathak won it in 2019 by 14,000 votes. The seat was won by Dimple Yadav in a bypoll in 2012. She retained it in the 2014 election but lost it to Pathak. Dimple Yadav was later fielded from Mainpuri in the 2022 bypoll due to the death of Mulayam Singh Yadav. Notably, She won by nearly three lakh votes. After which she was re-nominated from the seat.
The SP is allied with the Congress-led I.N.D.I.A bloc 2024 Lok Sabha Elections. It is contesting 63 constituencies of UP's 80 Lok Sabha seats. The other 17 have been alloted to Congress.