The season of changing loyalties has begun in Uttar Pradesh. Leaders, who publicly vowed allegiance to one party, are now happily doing the same in another party. Political equations are changing and for most, it is a time for homecoming.
Former UP Assembly Speaker Dhani Ram Varma, who had joined the Bahujan Samaj Party just before the 2007 polls and had got his son Mahesh Varma elected from Aurraiya on a BSP ticket, decided it was time to return home.
He now terms his sojourn in the BSP as a “big mistake” and promises to make amends by ensuring a majority for the Samajwadi Party in the coming elections.
Mr Varma and his son have returned to the Samajwadi Party a day after another father-son duo, Naresh Agarwal and son Nitin Agarwal, also returned home.
Anther “family” waiting to return to the Samajwadi Party are mafia don-turned-politician D.P. Yadav and his wife Urmilesh. Both were elected as Rashtriya Parivartan Dal members in 2007 but had later merged their party into the BSP. Ms Yadav was later disqualified by the Election Commission on charges of electoral malpractice.
BSP MLA Nawab Qazim Ali has also returned to the Congress after enjoying a five-year stint in the BSP. He had been elected on a Samajwadi Party ticket in 2007 but resigned to re-contest the polls on a BSP ticket. In 2002, he had won the seat on a Congress ticket. His mother, Begum Noor Bano, is a former Congress MP from Rampur.
Another BSP MLA, Chandra Bhadra Singh from Isauli in Sultanpur, has shifted loyalties to the Peace Party after being denied ticket in the BSP. His brother Yash Bhadra Singh will now contest the seat on a Peace Party ticket.
The biggest surprise, however, comes from dreaded mafia don Brijesh Singh, who will be contesting the Syed Raza Assembly seat in Ghazipur district as a candidate of the Pragatisheel Manav Samaj Party.
His candidature from this unknown political outfit comes as a surprise since his wife is a BSP MLC and his nephew Sushil Singh is a BSP MLA.
Brijesh Singh, arrested in 2008 from Orissa, is currently lodged in jail.