Lok Sabha polls | 'Yadav Factor' key in 10 Uttar Pradesh constituencies that vote today

Uttar Pradesh, which has seen two phases of polling on April 11 and April 18, is now voting in the third phase on April 23 with 10 constituencies in the fray – Moradabad, Rampur, Sambhal, Firozabad, Mainpuri, Etah, Badaun, Aonla, Bareilly, Pilibhit.

The third phase in Uttar Pradesh is underlined by the Yadav factor, especially with Mainpuri going to polls. Mainpuri has been the bastion of Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, and has stayed with the Yadavs for over two decades.

Of the 10 seats, seven were won by the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. Firozabad, Badaun and Mainpuri went to the Samajwadi Party (SP). The SP-BSP-RLD alliance will be expecting to consolidate the Yadav, Dalit and Muslim vote bank in these seats this time also.

In Moradabad, the gathbandhan has fielded ST Hasan, who was defeated by BJP’s sitting MP Kunwer Sarvesh Kumar by over 87,000 votes in the 2014 general election. Meanwhile, the Congress has fielded a poet – Imran Pratapgarhi – from this seat.

The Sambhal constituency, which has a significant Muslim population, was won by the BJP for the first time in the previous election, when the saffron party’s candidate Satyapal Saini defeated SP’s Shafiqur Rehman Warq by a thin margin of a mere 5,000 votes. While Warq has been retained as the alliance’s candidate, the BJP has fielded Parmeshwar Lal Saini this time.

Another seat under the lens will be Rampur – where BJP’s Jaya Prada will be contesting against SP’s Azam Khan. Azam Khan is under the Election Commission’s scanner for his underwear jibe at actor-turned-politician Jaya Prada. He was even banned from campaigning for 72 hours for his "indecent" remark.

The city of bangles, Firozabad, will witness a classic Yadav-vs-Yadav contest. Mulayam Singh's brother and senior SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav's son Akshay Yadav has been fielded from Firozabad. Akshay will take on his uncle, Shivpal Yadav, who floated his own party, the Progressive Democratic Alliance. Both Mayawati and Akhilesh have campaigned for Akshay in this region.

Badaun, on the other hand, is set to witness a battle between Dharmendra Yadav of the SP and Sanghmitra Maurya of the BJP. Dharmendra, who is Akhilesh’s cousin, had retained this seat in 2014. Sanghmitra is the daughter of senior leader Swami Prasad Maurya. The Congress has fielded Salim Iqbal Sherwani from this seat.

In Bareilly, the BJP has retained five-time MP Santosh Gangwar against the SP-BSP-RLD’s Bhagwat Sharan Gangwar. The Kurmi vote will be the deciding factor in this seat.

In the Pilibhit parliamentary seat, Varun Gandhi is pitted against former UP minister and Samajwadi Party leader Hemraj Verma. The alliance is trying to work on the consolidation of backward Lodha and Kurmi votes along with Muslim and Dalit votes.

While Aonla will see a close contest between BJP’s Dharmednra Kumar Kashyap and gathbandhan candidate Ruchi Veera; Etah has BJP’s Rajvir Singh, son of former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Kalyan Singh vs Devendra Yadav of the gathbandhan in the fray.

The election in these seats will seal the fate of four members of the Yadav family – Mulayam Singh, Shivpal, Akshay and Dharmendra.