BSP Releases 5th List Of 11 Candidates For LS Polls, Names Its Challenger To Modi From Varanasi

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) announced 11 more Lok Sabha election candidates for Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday. It names Athar Jamal Lari, 66, as the party’s candidate against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi. 

According to a Times of India report, Lari has been in politics since 1980, and has unsuccessfully contested three assembly and two Lok Sabha elections. He has been a member of several parties, including the Samajwadi Party, the report adds.

In the new list, the BSP, led by former UP chief minister, has also changed its candidate for the Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat, giving the ticket to Shiv Prasad Yadav.

Uttar Pradesh: BSP announced the names of 11 more candidates for Lok Sabha elections

The Mainpuri Lok Sabha ticket has been changed and given to Shiv Prasad Yadav.

Athar Jamal Lari has been fielded from Varanasi against PM Modi. pic.twitter.com/qSGERi22ik

— ANI UP/Uttarakhand (@ANINewsUP) April 16, 2024

The other candidates on the list are Muslim Khan (Badaun), Chhotalal Gangwar (Bareilly), Udraj Verma (Sultanpur), Kranti Pandey (Farrukhabad), Mayank Dwivedi (Banda), Khwaja Samsuddin (Domariyaganj), Lallan Singh Yadav (Ballia), former MP Dhananjay Singh’s wife Srikala Singh (Jaunpur), and Umesh Kumar Singh (Ghazipur).

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On Sunday, BSP supremo Mayawati said her party would take concrete steps to make western Uttar Pradesh a separate state if voted to power at the Centre. Addressing a rally in Muzaffarnagar in support of the BSP’s candidate from Muzaffarnagar, she also said the BJP had a very slim chance of coming to power again.

If free and fair elections are held and “voting machines are not tampered with”, the BJP will not return to power this time, she added. “Most of the BJP’s time was spent on making wealthy businessmen wealthier and protecting them… The BJP and other parties run their organisations and contest elections with the support of these businesses. This was revealed by electoral bond data,” she said.

The BSP had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha election in alliance with the Samajwadi Party (SP). It won 10 of the 38 seats it contested. Uttar Pradesh altogether has 80 seats.