UP MLC Election: BJP Announces Six More Candidates For Vidhan Parishad Polls As It Eyes 36 Vacant Seats

Prominent BJP candidates include former Congress MLC Dinesh Pratap Singh, former BSP leader Ramchandra Pradhan, and UP BJP general secretary Anoop Gupta.

Representative Photo: PTI

New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday announced six more candidates for Uttar Pradesh's legislative council elections slated to take place next month.

Its previous list of 30 candidates had included four former Samajwadi Party leaders, who had joined the BJP before the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.

The six candidates announced by BJP for the remaining seats are:

• Basti-Siddharth Nagar Local Authorities — Subhash Yeduvansh
  
  
• Kanpur-Fatehpur Local Authorities — Avinash Singh Chauhan
  
  
• Mirzapur-Sonbhadra Local Authorities Local Authorities — Vinit Singh
  
  
• Sultanpur Local Authorities Local Authorities — Shailendra Pratap Singh
  
  
• Varanasi Local Authorities Local Authorities — Dr. Sudama Singh Patel
  
  
• Jaunpur Local Authorities — Brijesh Singh Prinshu

Prominent BJP Candidates For UP Vidhan Parishad Polls

Earlier on Saturday, the BJP released a list of 30 candidates including the names of four former Samajwadi Party leaders: CP Chand from the Gorakhpur-Maharajganj local authorities, Ravishankar Singh 'Pappu' from Ballia local authorities, Rama Niranjan from Jhansi-Jalaun-Lalitpur local authorities, and Narendra Bhati from Bulandshahr local authorities.

Ahead of the recently concluded Uttar Pradesh election, several SP MLCs, including Narendra Singh Bhati, Shatrudra Prakash, Rama Niranjan, Ravishankar Singh Pappu, CP Chand, Ghanshyam Lodhi, Shailendra Pratap Singh, and Ramesh Mishra, had joined the saffron party.

The polls for the 36 seats belonging to local authorities constituencies within the state's Upper House were earlier scheduled to take place on two different dates but all of them would now be held together on April 9, news agency PTI reported sources in the office of the state's chief electoral officer as saying.

Prominent BJP candidates who figured in the party's previous list are former Congress MLC Dinesh Pratap Singh from Rae Bareli local authorities, former BSP leader Ramchandra Pradhan from Lucknow-Unnao local authorities, and UP BJP general secretary Anoop Gupta from Khiri local authorities electoral college.

The ruling party has also fielded KP Shrivastava as its candidate from the Allahabad local authority seat.

For BJP, the MLC polls will be an opportunity to become the single-largest party in the House and enjoy a majority in both Houses of the UP Legislature.

BJP Currently Has 35 MLCs, SP 17

According to the UP Vidhan Sabha's official website, the BJP has 35 MLCs, while SP has 17, and the BSP has four MLCs at present in the 100-member UP legislative council.

The Congress, Apna Dal (Sonelal), and NISHAD party have one member each in it.

The Teachers' group has two MLCs while the "Independent Group" ('Nirdal Samooh') and independents have one MLC each.

UP Vidhan Sabha's 36 seats fell vacant on March 7 after the expiry of terms of its members while the 37th seat fell vacant following the death of the Leader of Opposition Ahmad Hassan, belonging to the Samajwadi Party, after a prolonged illness.

As per PTI, the biennial election for the 36 out of 37 vacant seats for the upper House of the state's legislature -- Vidhan Parishad -- is to be held on April 9, the counting for which would be declared on April 12.

(With Agency Inputs)