Uttar Pradesh Elections Updates: Stage set for second phase of polls; 586 candidates in fray

The BSP released a list of 47 candidates on Sunday for the seventh phase of the ongoing Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. The list includes candidates for the constituencies of Azamgarh, Mau, Jaunpur, Ghazipur, Chandauli, Varanasi, Bhadohi, Mirzapur and Sonbhadra districts. (PTI)

Citizens of Kanpur city will receive a message “Kanpur Votes On 20 Feb” when they will purchase milk packets and bread packets from next week. It is a new and unique effort to create awareness for voting on February 20 for Legislative assembly elections. The idea was of district magistrate Neha Sharma who had convened a meeting with bread manufacturers and milk and processed milk companies and all of them supported her move.

Fifty-five seats spread across nine districts, including some in Rohilkhand region, will go to polls on Monday in the second phase of elections in Uttar Pradesh which will see senior Samajwadi Party leader Mohammad Azam Khan and state finance minister Suresh Khanna trying their luck at the hustings. (PTI)

Switching sides has always been a part of the poll scenario and this time is no different with almost all parties in Uttar Pradesh from the major ones like the BJP and Congress to smaller outfits like Apna Dal (Sonelal) seeing some legislators bidding them goodbye and some others joining them. The maximum gains from this flight of legislators has been to the BJP followed by the Samajwadi Party, while the losers are the BSP and the Congress. (PTI)

Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party Lohia (PSPL) chief Shivpal Yadav, who is contesting from Jaswantnagar seat of Etawah, on Saturday sought votes for his nephew and SP national president Akhilesh Yadav in neighbouring Karhal assembly segment of Mainpuri. Shivpal said, “Work will be done for the betterment of women, youth and farmers under leadership of Akhilesh Yadav.”

Once seen as the ‘deciding factor’ for their propensity for ‘strategic voting’, Muslims were a formidable electorate in Uttar Pradesh until the 2014 general elections, when BJP’s strategy of consolidating Hindu votes across the vast state’s deep caste divide pushed the minority vote to the margins.

Poll action in west UP is peaking with voting for the second phase tomorrow. TOI takes a look at 10 key contests and what makes them interesting.

Aam Aadmi Party candidate from Lucknow East, Alok Singh, found a woman arguing with the tempo driver over fare in Kalyanpur area during campaigning. He tried to calm both and informed the lady that the AAP government in Delhi has provided free travel to women in public transport.

CM Yogi on Saturday mounted yet another attack on the previous SP government terming it to ‘dumdaar’ instead of being ‘damdaar’ (strong). Addressing a rally in Saharanpur on the last day of campaigning for the second phase of elections, Yogi said, “Governments are strong only when they are honest. We have done this. While carrying out development, we built a university in Saharanpur in the name of Maa Shakambhari Devi. This university will change the future of the youth of Saharanpur and its adjoining districts,” he said.