Congress considers suspending UP votes amid doubts about winning seats allocated to SP: report

The Congress party is reportedly mulling over the decision not to contest the upcoming assembly by-elections in Uttar Pradesh as the party is not confident in its chances of winning the two seats offered by the Samajwadi Party (SP),

However, he intends to participate in campaigns in favor of his ally, the SP.

After being offered the Khair seat in Aligarh district and the Ghaziabad assembly seat by the SP, the grand old party decided not to field its candidates for these seats and return them to the SP, Herald of the Deccan reported citing sources in the UP Congress.

Congress’s decision to back down from the dispute reportedly resulted from the understanding that its chances of winning in any of the constituencies were slim.

‘It is better not to contest than to contest and lose,” said a senior UP Congress leader, as quoted by HD on Sunday.

An official announcement in this regard is likely to be made soon.

Another reason behind the party’s decision to withdraw from the by-elections appears to be that if the minority vote for the SP decreases in the by-elections, the Congress may claim that this was due to its decision to stay out of the contest.

This could demonstrate the value of Congress to the SP.

The Congress had initially demanded five seats, including Phulpur and Manjhawa, but the SP offered them only two – Khair and Ghaziabad – both considered strongholds of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

In the recent Lok Sabha elections, BJP candidate Atul Garg secured a decisive victory over Congress candidate Dolly Sharma in Ghaziabad, winning by a margin of 3.36 lakh votes.

Garg also led in the Ghaziabad constituency with a margin of over 60,000 votes.

Meanwhile, the Congress candidate for the Khair seat got just 0.6 percent votes in the 2022 state assembly elections.

The Congress reportedly did not want to “demoralize” its workers, who were excited after the party’s impressive performance in the state in the LS elections, by winning seven of the 17 seats it contested in UP.

The SP has already announced candidates for Sisamau, Manjhawa, Phulpur, Katehari and Karhal assembly constituencies.

By-elections for a total of nine assembly seats are scheduled for November 13.

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