BJP hopes to taste Lok Sabha success in Samajwadi Party's citadel Mainpuri

Samajwadi Party's (SP’s) Dimple Yadav won the Mainpuri Lok Sabha (LS) seat by nearly 290,000 votes in a bypoll in 2022, after her father-in-law Mulayam Singh Yadav, who had won the seat in 2019, passed away. Five years back, Mainpuri was one of only five seats that the SP had won in Uttar Pradesh. The SP has not lost the seat since 1996, the BJP has never won it, and the Congress, currently SP’s junior ally in UP, last won it in 1984.

The BJP, which won SP’s other two strongholds in bypolls in 2022, Rampur and Azamgarh, hopes to wrest Mainpuri, too, which goes to polls on May 7. The party has fielded Uttar Pradesh Tourism Minister and Mainpuri Sadar local legislator Jaiveer Singh. At an election rally on Sunday in Mainpuri, Union Home Minister Amit Shah promised the electorate that he would ensure Singh is entrusted with bigger responsibilities if he were to win Mainpuri. "You make him win and we will ensure that he becomes a big man," Shah said.

The highlight of Dimple’s 2024 fight is her daughter, Aditi Yadav, canvassing for her mother. Unlike in 2019, when tensions between SP chief Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav were still rife, and the latter floated his own party, the family has put forth a united front. The entire family was present when Dimple filed her nomination. Her husband Akhilesh and his uncles Shivpal and Ram Gopal Yadav accompanied her. The Bahujan Samaj Party, which was an ally of the SP in 2019, has fielded Shiv Prasad Yadav, but the contest is primarily one between the SP and the BJP.

In the 2022 Assembly polls, the BJP made inroads into Mainpuri, a stronghold of the SP’s first family. Of Mainpuri LS’ five assembly segments, the SP won three, including Akhilesh winning Karhal and Shivpal winning Jaswant Nagar seats. The BJP, meanwhile, won the Mainpuri and Bhogaon assembly seats.

Jaiveer Singh started his political career with the Congress, switched later to the BSP, and won an Assembly poll in 2002. He soon defected to be inducted as a minister in the Mulayam Singh Yadav-led government in the same year. Singh  returned to the BSP before the Assembly polls in 2007 and was a minister in the Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party government. 

2024 contenders

SP’s Dimple Yadav, incumbent MP

BJP’s  Jaiveer Singh

2019 Result

Mulayam Singh Yadav (SP) 53.66%

Prem Singh Shakya (BJP) 44.01%

Total electorate (2019) 1723236