Samajwadi Party supremo Akhilesh Yadav will contest the Lok Sabha Election 2024 from Uttar Pradesh’s Kannauj parliamentary constituency, the party announced on Wednesday.
The party further added that the former UP Chief Minister will file his nomination papers on Thursday.
Earlier, the party declared Tej Pratap Yadav as its candidate for the seat for which nominations are scheduled to start on Thursday but the party has now decided to go with Yadav as the final candidate.
When asked whether he will contest from the seat or Tej Pratap will remain the party’s candidate, Yadav told reporters, “See, when there are nominations, you will get to know. Maybe you will get to know before nominations also.”
When asked whether party workers of Kannauj wanted him to contest from the seat, Yadav said, “The question here is of historic victory from the seat. The BJP will become history in this election as people have made up their mind for INDIA bloc. People are going to vote against the NDA. PDA (picchde, Dalit, alpsankhyak) will defeat the NDA this time.”
Tej Pratap, who has been made party candidate from Kannauj, was the SP MP from Mainpuri between 2014-2019. He is also the son-in-law of RJD president Lalu Prasad Yadav and Akhilesh Yadav’s nephew.
Akhilesh had won from the Kannauj seat in 2000. Later, he represented the seat in 2004, 2009 and he left the seat after he became chief minister in 2012, and his wife Dimple Yadav won the by-election unopposed. Later, Dimple won from the seat in 2014 but she lost to BJP’s Subrat Pathak in 2019.
Voting on this seat will be held on May 13.