What is at stake in each state

New Delhi: Assembly by-elections are being held in seven states - Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal - on Saturday. Here's a look at what is at stake in each state.

UTTAR PRADESH

11 Assembly seats: Powayan, Lucknow West, Padrouna, Rari, Isauli, Jhansi, Kolasala, Hainsar Bazar, Lalitpur, Etawah, Bharthana.

1 Lok Sabha seat: Firozabad

• Will the Rahul wave continue in Uttar Pradesh? Will Mayawati make inroads into Samajwadi Party territory? Or will Mulayam hold on to his bastion?
  

• In the Firozabad Lok Sabha battle, a Raj Babbar win has become a prestige issue because Rahul Gandhi campaigned for him. Dimple Yadav, Mulayam Singh's daughter-in-law, is not a pushover here, and she too has unleashed star power with a lot of Bollywood campaigning for her. Defeating her will be an achievement for the Congress.
  

• Dimple Yadav has the advantage of contesting a seat that her husband won just six months ago. Even Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) is putting its might behind despite being in alliance with the BJP.
  

• Not to be discounted is SP Singh Baghel of the BSP. He is a Samajwadi Party rebel who has been a three-time MP of that party from Jalesar. Delimitation saw a large part of Jalesar merged into Firozabad and Baghel rebelled when Mulayam Singh gave the Firozabad ticket to son Akhilesh for Lok Sabha elections 2009. Baghel contested on a BSP ticket and lost to Akhilesh.
  

• This is a constituency that has a fractured caste base. Lodhs (Kalyan Singh factor), Ahir, Yadav, Muslim, Dalit, Jaat and the Sawarna are the major voters, the dominant being the Yadavs. There was infighting within the SP over greenhorn Dimple's candidature and it will be interesting to see whether people vote in favour of dynastic politics or reject it.
  

• The Congress must retain the Padrauna and Jhansi Assembly seats. Losing them would be damaging. Any extra seats won will mean that the Rahul magic of six months ago is still intact.
  

• Rani Mohini Devi, Mother of Kushinagar MP R P N Singh, is in the fray from Padrauna. She has both, the Congress wave and the family seat factor working for her.  The party might also spring a surprise in Lucknow West. It has gained in vote base across the city and in the Lok Sabha elections, Rita Joshi, the Congress candidate was number two and she only had 10 days to campaign for the election.
  

• Lucknow West, which fell vacant after Lalji Tandon became an MP from Lucknow, is the only seat the BJP fancies its chance in. Amit Puri is using Vajpayee's name to help ensure a win. He even goes to the extent of wearing a Vajpayee kurta while canvassing. Lalji Tandon has also campaigned aggressively for him.
  

• The by-election results will not affect the BSP in the Assembly as the party has a comfortable majority, but could well be interpreted as a referendum on over two years of Mayawati rule.
  

• In the last by-elections, the BSP won three out of four seats and snatched two from the Samajwadi Party. But that was because those seats were personality-driven and not party-driven.
  

• Mayawati has not campaigned for a single candidate and she is believed to be testing her cadre in these Samajwadi-Party-dominated constituencies.
  

• Six of the 11 are Samajwadi Party seats. For Mulayam Singh though, retaining them this time is a bigger challenge than acquiring more.
  

 
WEST BENGAL:

10 Assembly seats: Kanthi South, Egra, Bongaon, Serampore, Alipore, Sujapur, Goalpokhar, Kalchini, Rajpur, Belgachia East.

• These by-elections are being seen as a semi-final to the 2011 Assembly polls in West Bengal.  In the 2006 Assembly polls, the Left got 235 seats out of the 294 seats and the Opposition shared 59. But given the reverses the Left has suffered since, these elections will test where it stands.
  

• In the 10 seats going to the polls on Saturday, the Trinamool had five, Congress two and Left three.
  

 
HIMACHAL PRADESH:

2 Assembly seats: Rohru and Jawali

• Virbhadra Singh has represented Rohru for five terms as a chief ministerial candidate. If the Congress candidate loses in this constituency, it will be considered a Virbhadra Singh's loss.

 
RAJASTHAN:

2 Assembly seats: Salumber, Todabhim

• The ruling Congress would like to win these as this will be the first test of popularity for the Ashok Gehlot government in the state after its impressive victory in this year's Lok Sabha polls, in which the party won 20 of the 25 seats leaving one to an Independent and four to the BJP.
  

KERALA:

3 Assembly seats: Ernakulam, Kannur and Alappuzha

• The by-elections in Kerala will be referendum for the Left after the debacle in the Lok Sabha poll.
  

• Retaining all the three seats is important for the Congress as the by-polls are seen as a curtain raiser for the local body polls next year and the Assembly polls in early 2011.
  

• Although by-elections are being held for three seats, it's Kannur that the Left really cares about, mainly because it's a battle for prestige. This part of north Kerala is a Left stronghold, with the odd exception of the Kannur Assembly seat.  The last time the CPM won the Kannur Assembly seat was in 1957.  So the chief minister and almost half his Cabinet colleagues have been camping in this constituency.

 
CHHATTISGARH:

1 Assembly seat: Vaishali Nagar

• The poll for the Vaishali Nagar seat in Durg district of Chhattisgarh was necessitated after the sitting legislator of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Saroj Pandey got elected to the Lok Sabha this year and vacated the seat.

 
ASSAM:

2 Assembly seats: Salmara South, Dhekiajuli

• The by-poll in South Salmara will be important for both the Congress and the AUDF. This election will be a do-or-die for Wajed Ali Chowdhury, the Congress candidate, while winning it is a matter of prestige for the AUDF, which is making all efforts to regain the seat through Abdur Rahman Ajmal, the son of Badruddin Ajmal.