Ayodhya (Uttar Pradesh) [India], January 16 : The Bharatiya Janata Party's candidate for the upcoming by-poll to Uttar Pradesh's Milkipur Assembly seat in Ayodhya district, Chandrabhan Paswan, filed his nomination on Thursday. BJP's former Faizabad (Ayodhya) MP Lallu Singh and the party's state unit chief Bhupendra Singh were also present during the filing of the nomination.
The Milkipur by-poll is expected to be a highly prestigious battle for the BJP as the party lost the Faizabad parliamentary seat to the Samajwadi Party in the Lok Sabha election last year. Samajwadi Party's Awadhesh Prasad emerged victorious from the seat.
Speaking to ANI earlier, Chandrabhan Paswan expressed gratitude to the party leadership.
"I thank the people of Milkipur, leaders of BJP, Yogi Adityanath, and PM Narendra Modi who expressed faith in me and I will serve the people day and night. The focus will remain on the issue of development and serving the public with the blessings of the people and Lord Ram. I will work to win the seat for BJP," said Paswan.
For the Milkipur by-polls, the Samajwadi Party has fielded Awadhesh Prasad's son Ajit Prasad. Awadhesh Prasad was the MLA of Milkipur before he got elected to the Lok Sabha. The Congress, Samajwadi Party's INDIA bloc ally, has decided not to field any candidate from Milkipur and has instead announced support for Ajit.
The Samajwadi Party has submitted a memorandum to the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Uttar Pradesh, demanding webcasting of all 414 polling stations in the Milkipur assembly constituency.
The party has requested that the webcasting link be shared with the candidates and recognized political parties, enabling them to monitor the voting process and ensure free, fair, and transparent elections. The bypoll in Milkipur is scheduled for February 5 and the counting of votes is slated to take place on February 8.
The last date for filing the nomination is January 17 while the date of scrutiny of nomination is January 18. The last date for the withdrawal of candidatures is January 20. Earlier, the Election Commission (EC) had postponed the by-polls for the Milkipur seat in October due to a pending election petition.