Akhilesh Yadav Says Won’t Contest UP Election Next Year, Party Clarifies
Akhilesh Yadav is a Samajwadi Party MP from Azamgarh and has never contested a state election.
Lucknow:
Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has said he will not contest the Uttar Pradesh election next year, but his party insists a decision will be taken collectively and there is none yet.
Akhilesh Yadav was quoted by Press Trust of India as saying: “I will not be contesting the assembly election myself”.
The former Chief Minister is a Samajwadi Party MP from Azamgarh and has never contested a state election.
Soon after the news emerged in PTI, his party rushed to clarify.
“BJP will be wiped out of Uttar Pradesh. The people of UP are with Samajwadi Party. Whether or not Akhilesh Yadav will contest the assembly election will be decided by the party,” Samajwadi Party’s Aashish Yadav, a close aide of the former UP Chief Minister, tweeted.
Akhilesh Yadav did not contest the 2017 or 2012 election either.
In 2012, when he led the Samajwadi Party to an emphatic victory, he took over as the country’s youngest Chief Minister at 38. He was a Lok Sabha MP from Kannauj at the time.
Even then, he took the route of the Legislative Council. His wife Dimple Yadav was elected unopposed from the seat he vacated, Kannauj.
