BJP leader Subrata Pathak is comparing his contest with SP’s Akhilesh Yadav from the Kannauj Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh to an India-Pakistan match.

Talking to media recently, Pathak said, “If Tej Pratap Yadav had contested from here, it would have been like a cricket match between India and Nepal. But now with Akhilesh throwing his hat in the poll ring, I would call it the India-Pakistan match.”

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He obviously called himself the Indian team and Akhilesh the Pakistan team.

The Samajwadi Party (SP) had earlier announced the name of Tej Pratap as its candidate from this seat, but Akhilesh made a last-minute entry.

The Kannauj Lok Sabha seat is going to the polls in the fourth phase in a tough contest, like the previous two elections in 2014 and 2019. In the last two elections, there was a close fight between both SP and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

In 2014, the SP won by a margin of 20,000 votes, while in 2019, the BJP won by a slender margin of 13,000 votes.

The SP, which lost this seat to the BJP last time after winning seven consecutive elections, is trying to get it back again. How serious SP is about this seat can be gauged from the fact that party chief Akhilesh Yadav himself is in the fray. The BJP has again fielded Subrata Pathak, who had won this seat from SP last time. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has fielded Imran bin Zafar.

Kannauj, considered a stronghold of the Samajwadi Party since 1998, could witness an interesting battle of votes.

Presently, Akhilesh is an MLA from the Karhal assembly segment under the Mainpuri parliamentary seat, where his wife Dimple Yadav had contested.

However, political observers feel that the candidature of Akhilesh from Kannauj had boosted the cadre of the party and would reflect in the prospect of the adjoining seats of Mainpuri and Ferozabad Lok Sabha seats, from which other family members of Akhilesh Yadav had contested.

The Kannauj parliamentary seat, which came into existence in 1967, has been dominated by non-BJP and non-Congress parties. Congress candidates have won the seat twice in the initial phase, in 1971 and 1984. The BJP has also been successful twice, in 1996 and 2019.

Apart from this, parties with socialist ideologies have been successful 11 times. The Samajwadi Party has hoisted its flag from here at least seven times. The SP, which wrested this seat from the BJP in 1996, has achieved success in seven consecutive elections between 1998 and 2014. It has been competing with the BSP and BJP in past elections but on the other hand, it has faced tough competition from the BJP in the last two elections.

In the 2014 elections, the BJP gave a tough competition to the SP for the first time. Then sitting MP Dimple Yadav could barely save her seat. After this, in the 2019 elections, the BJP’s Subrata Pathak wrested this seat from Dimple Yadav in a very tough contest. In 2014, the BSP was in third place. In the year 2019, BSP was in alliance with SP.