Digital desk: Dalit leader and Bhim Army president Chandrashekhar Azad to contest against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath from the Gorakhpur City assembly seat in the upcoming state assembly election.
Chandrashekhar, who founded the Azad Samaj Party (ASP), has previously stated that he would face Adityanath in whatever election he wanted to contest.
On Thursday, a senior ASP leader announced that the party had decided to nominate Chandrashekhar for the Gorakhpur City assembly seat and that he had accepted to contest from there.
“I appreciate the party’s decision to field me against Yogi Adityanath... I had always fought for the interests of the Dalit’s and would continue to do so in the future.” Chandrashekhar stated.
The Dalit leader had previously had talks with Akhilesh Yadav, the president of the Samajwadi Party (SP), to create an electoral alliance; however, the talks didn’t fall in place as the former demanded over a dozen seats while the latter was only willing to provide two.
Chandrashekhar has evolved as an important contender to BSP chief Mayawati, particularly in the Western UP region. He has been proactive in the western districts of Saharanpur, Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, Bulandshahar, and others and launched a series of community-related agitational initiatives in the region.
Even though his party had contested only in one of the seven assembly seats for by-poll in Uttar Pradesh in 2020, the number of votes received by its nominee astonished many. The Azad Samaj Party’s lone candidate for the Bulandshahar assembly seat astonished everyone by receiving more than 13,500 votes, putting the BSP nominee’s election prospects in jeopardy.
According to BSP leaders, Chandrashekhar, who exerted great influence among the ‘dalit’ population, particularly in western UP, constituted a “severe threat” to the BSP.
Chandrashekhar confirmed that his party would run candidates in the next UP assembly elections.
“We believe Mayawati has failed to protect the Dalits interests,” Chandrashekhar stated.
