Battlelines in UP drawn for 2024 as Akhilesh resigns LS seat, set to be leader of opposition in assembly

Akhilesh will now retain his Karhal assembly seat and Azam Khan will keep his Rampur seat

Apparently encouraged by his party's performance in the recently concluded assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav, whose party gave a tough fight to the BJP, on Tuesday resigned his Azamgarh Lok Sabha seat and decided to retain Karhal assembly seat, which he had won in the assembly elections, indicating that he, with his alliance partners, was gearing up to take on the saffron party in the next big battle in the state-the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.

SP Lok Sabha member from Rampur Azam Khan, who was currently lodged in jail in connection with scores of criminal cases lodged against him, also resigned his Lok Sabha seat on Tuesday. Khan had won the Rampur assembly seat in the recent polls in the state.

Akhilesh, who handed over his resignation to Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla, was all set to be elected as the leader of the SP legislature party which would be meeting here on Saturday and become the leader of the opposition in the state assembly.

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According to the SP leaders here, Akhilesh decided to resign his Lok Sabha seat after consultation with the senior party leaders and newly elected legislators. The SP president had earlier indicated that he could retain Azamgarh and resign from Karhal.

''The newly elected legislators wanted Akhilesh to shift base to the state...as leader of the opposition he will be in a better position to take on the BJP,’’ said a senior SP leader while speaking to DH here. ''As leader of the opposition Akhilesh can raise the issues concerning the people of the state forcefully in the House,'' he added.

Sources in the SP said that BJP had already started wooing their alliance partners. "They are being offered ministerial berths also,'' said the SP leader.

Media reports claimed recently that Om Prakash Rajbhar, the president of the Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP), who had contested the assembly polls in alliance with the SP, had meetings with some top BJP leaders though Rajbhar had refuted the reports. ''It is important for us to keep our alliances intact if we are to challenge the BJP in the 2024 LS polls,'', the SP leader added.

Akhilesh had earlier said that the results of the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections had proved that the saffron party could be defeated. ''We have shown that the seats of the BJP can be reduced. This decrease (in BJP seats) will continue and we have already reached the halfway mark. The rest will be achieved in the days to come,'' Akhilesh had said.

SP had won only 47 seats in the 2017 assembly polls and the party had secured 21 percent votes. Its tally rose to 111 and its vote percentage increased to 32 percent.

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