UP elections 2022: Lakhimpur Kheri that hit headlines over farmers' killing to vote on Feb 23
Lakhimpur Kheri (Uttar Pradesh), February 21: Lakhimpur Kheri, which hit the headlines in October last year for the alleged killing of the protesting farmers, is slated to go to the polls on February 23 in the ongoing Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.
Bharatiya Janata Party's Yogesh Verma won the Lakhimpur seat in the 2017 Assembly elections by defeating Samajwadi Party's Utkarsh Verma Madhur with a huge margin of over 37,000 votes. However, in 2022 assembly polls, the prestige of the Union Minister of State for the Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni will also be at stake in the Lakhimpur Kheri constituency.
For the unversed, Ajay Mishra Teni is a local MP who has been at the centre of controversy after his son was named as prime accused in the FIR in the incident leading to the deaths of the farmers.
Interestingly, both the leading parties BJP and the SP have repeated their candidates from the seat.
Also Read | ‘Chausar is biggest Punjabi political web series in history of Punjab’, says PTC MD Rabindra Narayan
Because of the political heat generated by the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in Parliament and everywhere else, the constituency will be the centre of attention in the ongoing assembly elections.
Congress has fielded Ravi Shankar Trivedi while the BSP has pitted Mohan Bajpai from the seat. Khushi Kinnar from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is also in the race along with AIMIM candidate Mohammad Usman Siddiqui.
Mohammadi, Gola Gokarannath, Kasta, Lakhimpur, Srinagar, Nighasan, Dhaurahara, and Palia Kalan are the eight Assembly constituencies in the Kheri Lok Sabha seat.
A total of 28,02,835 people will cast their vote, including 1307623 female voters. Furthermore, a total of 42,911 first-time voters have been added to the list of voters in the constituency.
Notably, the BJP had swept all the seats in the district in the 2017 assembly elections.
On October 3, eight people, including four protesting farmers, were killed after allegedly being mowed down by an SUV belonging to Union Minister Ajay Mishra Teni's son Ashish. A local journalist was also killed in the followed violence.
Ashish Mishra, the prime accused in the case, was arrested. Recently, the Allahabad High Court granted bail to Ashish Mishra in connection to the killing of farmers protesting in Lakhimpur Kheri.
Also Read | India's daily Covid-19 cases continue to remain below 1 lakh
-PTC News
