Samajwadi Party confident of wresting Etah from clutches of controversial BJP MP Rajveer Singh

Samajwadi Party candidate from Etah Lok Sabha constituency Devendra Singh Yadav on Friday filed his nomination papers for the upcoming elections at the district magistrate’s office in Kasganj.

A two-term MP from the seat who was the runner-up in the 2014 elections, Yadav expressed confidence that the gathbandhan will emerge victorious on the seat which has a large Lodh community, besides having a sizable Muslim and Yadav vote. Etah is among ten Lok Sabha constituencies in Uttar Pradesh which will go to elections during the third phase of polling on March 23.

Rajveer Singh, the sitting MP from the seat and son of former Uttar Pradesh CM Kalyan Singh, also comes from the Lodh caste, which was a deciding factor in his victory in 2014.

But Yadav claims that Rajveer’s victory had more to do with the “Modi wave” in 2014, which helped him consolidate the OBC vote in the constituency.

“This election is going to be about farmer distress and unemployment. There is no Modi wave. People now know that he lied for votes in 2014,” Yadav told NH from Kasganj, after filing his nomination papers.

“This time around, it is a one-sided contest,” said a close aide of Yadav.

“There was a gathering of a lakh people when Kunwarji went to file his nomination papers,” he added.

Maulana Ashraf, a local voter, said that the wave in favour of the BJP was only being seen on TV channels and the media. “The ground reality is entirely different,” said Ashraf. “Most of the people in our neighbourhood will vote for Kunwarji (Yadav),” he said.

BJP leaving no stone unturned to retain the seat

Traditionally a SP-BSP stronghold which fell to the BJP after Kalyan Singh, elected as MP in 2009 after floating his Jan Kranti Party, merged his outfit with the BJP (his son Rajveer contested and won on a BJP ticket in 2014), the BJP has been trying its utmost best to polarise the electorate to its advantage.

A communal riot in Kasganj on Jan 26 last year, after activists from Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) took out a bike rally through a Muslim neighbourhood was somewhat successful as far as BJP’s political ambitions were concerned. Rajveer, four days after the incident, gave a provocative speech in the district.

“The communal riot helped the BJP here,” says Amit Tewari, a local journalist.

For Tiwari, while the contest in Kasganj is between SP and the BJP, he predicts a BJP win by a narrow margin.

“It is going to be a close contest here,” he admits.

In fact, Union Textiles Minister Smriti Irani, a star campaigner for the BJP in UP, will be accompanying Rajveer Singh on Saturday when he files his nomination papers for the April 23 vote.

Having a total of over 15 lakh voters at the time of last elections, Etah comprises Amapur, Kasganj, Patiyali, Etah and Marhara. Assembly constituencies.