As EC seeks reply from Tej Bahadur, Shalini Yadav claims she is still SP’s official candidate

The SP candidate who alleged a conspiracy by the BJP to annul his candidature, said he will approach the Supreme Court .

Samajwadi party’s Lok Sabha candidate from the crucial Varanasi seat Tej Bahadur who has been issued a notice by the Election Commission to furnish a certificate of his dismissal from the BSF, has to reply to the notice by 11 am on Wednesday.

New Delhi: Samajwadi party’s Lok Sabha candidate from the crucial Varanasi seat Tej Bahadur who has been issued a notice by the Election Commission  to furnish a certificate of his dismissal from the BSF, has to reply to the notice by 11 am on Wednesday. The SP candidate who alleged a conspiracy by the BJP to annul his candidature, said he will approach the Supreme Court . Shalini Yadav says she remains party’s official candidate Amid the ongoing row over Bahadur’s candidature, SP leader Shalini Yadav said she is still the official candidate of the party. The SP, which is in an alliance with the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Rashtriya Lok Dal, had earlier declared Shalini Yadav as its candidate from Varanasi. EC seeks reply by 11 am: The Varanasi district Returning Officer (RO) on Tuesday issued a notice to Yadav to furnish a certificate on whether or not he was dismissed from the service for corruption or disloyalty to the government. Yadav has to furnish the certificate before the RO till 11 am on Wednesday. The certificate will be issued by the Election Commission of India. "You have not submitted the certificate to the effect that whether or not you were dismissed from the service for corruption or disloyalty with your nomination papers," RO Surendra Singh said in the notice. It further said: "You are directed through this notice to submit the aforementioned certificate till 11 am on May 1, 2019." Tej Bahadur on EC notice, “We have submitted complete documents” Tej Bahadur, however, said that he had submitted all requisite documents and the notice was a conspiracy against him. He said, "I have submitted all of the documents. This is being done to make us stop from contesting the election." "It is just a conspiracy against us. Modi ji is scared and it has been done intentionally," said Yadav. Yadav was dismissed from BSF in 2017 after complaining about the poor quality of food served to soldiers in a viral video. He had posted four videos on social media in January 2017, which showed him complaining about unpalatable food at his camp along the Indo-Pakistan border in Jammu and Kashmir. Varanasi election: Varanasi seat was won by Prime Minister Modi in the last Lok Sabha elections. He had defeated AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal with a massive margin of 3.37 lakh votes The election in Varanasi is slated to take place in the last phase of seven-phased Lok Sabha elections on May 19. The counting of votes will begin on May 23. (inputs from agencies)