Uttar Pradesh Elections 2022: The Samajwadi Party (SP) of Akhilesh Yadav on Monday released the list of 159 candidates for the upcoming assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.
Former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav will contest from Karhal assembly seat in Mainpuri. Nahid Hasan has been fielded from Kairana while Pankaj Kumar Malik will be contesting from Muzzafarnagar.
Former state minister Dharam Singh Saini, who crossed over to the SP from the BJP a few days ago, has been named as the party's nominee from Nakur in Saharanpur district.
The party has fielded jailed leader Azam Khan from his traditional Rampur seat while his son Abdullah Azam has been made the party candidate from Suar Tanda.
Shivpal Yadav, who is the uncle of Akhilesh Yadav, has been declared the party candidate from the family bastion of Jaswantnagar in Etawah district.
Among the turncoats, who got the SP ticket, are Brijesh Prajapati (Tindwari in Banda) and Roshan Lal Verma (Tilhar in Shahjahanpur).
Bhagwati Sagar has been fielded from Ghatampur seat. Bhagwati Sagar was the sitting BJP MLA from Bilhaur Assembly constituency in Kanpur.
Supriya Aron, who recently parted ways with the Congress, has been named as the party candidate from Bareilly Cantt.
The Congress had already named her as the party's candidate from there. From Hardoi, the party has fielded Anil Verma, after its sitting MLA Nitin Agarwal has been named as the BJP candidate from the same seat.
Star campaigners
SP patron Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akhilesh Yadav and new entrant to the party Swami Prasad Maurya are among its 30 star campaigners for the first phase of the assembly election.
The other prominent star campaigners are national vice-president Kiranmay Nanda, principal general secretary Ramgopal Yadav, Rajya Sabha MP Jaya Bachchan, the party's Uttar Pradesh unit chief Naresh Uttam Patel, leader of opposition in the Assembly Ramgobind Chaudhary.
The party's national executive member Javed Ali Khan and Samajwadi Yuvjan Sabha president Mohammad Fahad have also been named as star campaigners. Dara Singh Chauhan and Dharam Singh Saini, who quit as ministers and from the BJP to join the SP, are not in the list of 30 star campaigners.
With inputs from PTI
