Mayawati's party has a strong presence in all the eight seats (file)
The Bahujan Samaj Party, led by former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati, has announced its candidates for eight of the 27 Madhya Pradesh Assembly constituencies that will go to bypolls later this year. This comes a day after the party announced it will contest all the seats, dashing the Congress's hope for a direct fight with its main rival - the BJP.
The BSP candidates declared for the eight seats, include former MLA Soneram Kushwah (Joura seat), Ramprakash Rajauria (Morena), Bhanupratap Singh Sakhwar (Ambah), Yogesh Meghsingh Narwaria (Mehgaon), Jaswant Patwari (Gohad), Santosh Gaud (Dabra), Kailash Kushwah (Pohri) and Rajendra Jatav (Karera) in Shivpuri.
Out of the 27 seats, 16 constituency fall in the Gwalior-Chambal region, which is considered to be the stronghold of former Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia, whose exit with 22 MLAs led to the collapse of the Kamal Nath government earlier this year.
Most of the seats where Mr Scindia had influence had been won by the Congress in 2018 as he was thought to be the front-runner for the post of the chief minister, which ultimately eluded him.
Mayawati's party has a strong presence in all the eight seats. The party has won seven out of them in the past. The BSP won the Joura seat in 1993, 1998 and 2008; Morena seat in 2008); Ambah seat in 2014; Mehgaon in 1993; Gohad in 1993; Dabra in 1993; and Karera in 2003.
In the 2018 Assembly election, the BSP finished second behind Congress in Joura and Pohri seats, and third behind Congress and BJP candidates in Morena, Gohad, Dabra and Karera seats.
According to the political pundits, the BSP contesting elections in all the 27 seats doesn't augur well for the Congress, which is having a hard time finding suitable candidates as most of the influential leaders had followed Mr Scindia into the BJP. The Congress also runs the risk of conceding its scheduled caste votes to the BSP, which will benefit the BJP in a triangular contest.
Out of the 27 seats going to bypolls in the coming months, 25 had fallen vacant due to Congress MLAs quitting the assembly -- most of them would be BJP candidates.