SP's prestige at stake in capital Lucknow's 9 seats

Ruling Samajwadi Party is facing a tough battle as it tries to retain the seven Assembly seats it had won last time out of nine in Uttar Pradesh capital, while BJP and BSP queer the pitch.

The two other seats were shared by BJP and Congress.

The SP candidates include Mulayam Singh Yadav's daughter-in-law Aparna Yadav and three ministers, one of whom was recently sacked.

BJP has preferred to field turncoats on two seats - Lucknow Central and Lucknow Cantt. Rita Bahuguna Joshi, who had won on Congress ticket last time, has been fielded by BJP from Cantt seat against Aparna.

BSP has fielded Yogesh Dixit, who is trying to woo voters by promising good governance by party supremo Mayawati.

Lucknow Central is also witnessing a keen contest, where sitting SP MLA and cabinet minister Ravidas Mehrotra is facing an uphill task with Congress candidate Maroof Khan refusing to withdraw from the field despite a tie-up between the two parties.

BJP has given ticket to former MP Brijesh Pathak, a fromer Lucknow University student union president, who switched from BSP.

BSP has given ticket to Rajiv Srivastava here.

An interesting contest is on in Sarojini Nagar seat, where BJP's woman face and state women wing chief Swati Singh is in fray. BJP has never won the seat.

However, this time the situation for SP is difficult with its MLA Sharda Prasad Shukla contesting on RLD ticket after being spurned by the party.

SP has given ticket to Anurag Yadav, cousin of SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, BSP has fielded Shiv Shankar Singh alias Shankari, while BJP rebel Rudra Daman Singh alias Babloo is also in the fray on Shiv Sena ticket.

Babloo was runners up on the seat in 2012 polls and secured 41,333 votes, much more than BJP candidate Virendra Tiwari, who got only 29,339 votes and finished third.