Akhilesh Yadav
In picture: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh YadavTwitter/Akhilesh Yadav

The Samajwadi Party released a list of 191 candidates on Friday, a day after Mulayam Singh Yadav gave his son and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav a list of 38 candidates.

After weeks-long public fighting within the party, the Election Commissioner allotted the party symbol, cycle, to Akhilesh Yadav, who wrested control of the party from his father this month. 

In the list released on Friday, Shivpal Singh Yadav received a ticket from Jaswantnagar. 

  • Arvind Singh Gope gets a ticket in place of Beni Prasad Verma's son Rakesh Verma in Barabanki.
  • Naresh Agrawal's son Nitin Agrawal gets ticket from Hardoi.
  • Azam Khan's son Abdullah Azam gets ticket from Suar (Rampur).
  • Hassan Rumi gets ticket from Kanpur Cantt in place of Atiq Ahmad. 

"We will release party manifesto for the Assembly Elections on Monday," said senior SP leader Kiranmoy Nanda. "We offered 54 seats to Congress but we have not got any positive response from them. We can give additional 25-26 seats (apart from 54) more to Congress." 

"Samajwadi Party will contest in all seats in Amethi and 4 seats (out of 5) in Raebareli," he said. 

The leader also said on Friday that the seat-sharing with Congress was not final after saying a day earlier that they would be looking to tie up only with Congress.  

"We'll fight on 300+ seats, number of seats to be given to Congress is subject to adjustment and discussion after the alliance happens," he said. 

However, the spokesperson's statement on Congress was discredited by a SP MP who said, "What Kiranmoy Nanda said abt Cong alliance is his personal opinion, Natn'l Pres Akhilesh Yadav to take final decision," said SP MP Naresh Agrawal to ANI. "CM Akhilesh Yadav is looking into details of Congress alliance, he'll take final decision. By evening things might be clear." 

From Uttar Pradesh, Congress had been fielding Sheila Dikshit as the chief ministerial candidate however if the "grand alliance" takes place then Akhilesh Yadav-backed by Congress will be contesting elections. The two parties are reportedly trying to woo Muslim voters, who make up 18 percent of the state population. They are also aiming to get 35-37 percent votes in the upcoming elections. Their main contendors are the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party. 

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