After a series of victories in a number of bye-elections across Uttar Pradesh over the past three years since it rode on to power, the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party sprung yet another surprise by registering a sweeping win over its rivals in yet
another bye-election for the Domariyaganj constituency, on Monday.
The Bahujan Samaj Party nominee Khatoon Taufique defeated Bhartiya Janata Party candidate Prem Prakash Tiwari by a margin of 15842 votes. It was the sudden death of Khatoon's husband Taufique Ahmed that necessitated the bye-election. This helps the BSP retain its strength of 226 in the 403 member UP assembly.
The Samajwadi Party and the Congress suffered a humiliating defeat with their candidates losing their deposits.
A sympathy wave in the widow's favour led her to win by a margin that was 15 times the margin with which her husband had bagged the seat at the last assembly election.
However, what cannot be underscored was the role of the newly formed Peace Party , which clearly played spoilsport for each of BSP's rivals. A regional outfit, claiming to champion the cause of Muslims, the Peace Party has been busy mobilising Muslims in a big way in large parts of eastern UP. Yet, for strategic reasons, it fielded a Hindu candidate Sachchidanand, who polled a handsome 26,336 votes to claim the third position and that was clearly a major setback for both Samajwadi Party and Congress, which trailed at the fourth and fifth positions respectively. Both the candidates lost their deposits.
The SP nominee Kamal Yusuf, who had lost in 2007 by a thin margin of 1049 votes, polled 21,924 votes this time. The Congress too had repeated Ashok Kumar Singh as it's candidate, but he only 19,206 votes.
