Just a day after Christmas, Rahul had addressed a public meeting in Maholi area of Sitapur district to campaign for Gaya Prasad (party nominee for Maholi) and Omprakash Rawat from Mishrikh (reserved). Both had shared the dais with Rahul. Rawat had also addressed the crowd. Hardly a fortnight later, the Congress has replaced Rawat with Ram Krishna Bhargava. Asked about the change, a Congress leader said: “Rawat was not on a strong wicket, but changing the candidate after Rahul had campaigned for him will not send a good message either.’’

Two days later, Rahul was at Sisaiya in Lakhimpur Khiri campaigning for Samar Pratap Singh, Congress candidate from Dhaurara, and Mohan Chand Upreti (Nighasan). Now, the party has replaced Upreti with Ajay Verma following reports that a Kurmi candidate would be in a better standing to win the seat.

A senior party leader in Lakhimpur Khiri said that they had informed party leadership about caste equations in the area and had told them that a good Kurmi candidate would fare well. “First, the party ignored our request, now they have changed the candidate at the last moment and has given the ticket to Verma, who had joined the party when Rahul visited Gola Gokarannath,” the leader said.

In Balamau (reserved) constituency, the party has replaced Vishambar Dayal with a retired IAS officer, R A Prasad. In an another reserved constituency Mahadeva, the party has replaced Gauri Shankar Kanaujia with Chandra Prakash Kanaujia. At Patherdeva, from where BJP’s state president Surya Pratap Shahi is contesting, Congress has replaced Niyaz Ahmad Khan with Suyashmani Tripathi and at Nizamabad Poornmasi Prajapati has replaced Dr Hembala Yadav.

With this list the Congress has announced candidates for 325 seats in the 403-member state Assembly. With the Congress earmarking 45 seats to the RLD, it now has to announce candidates for 33 more seats. The RLD also announced five more candidates today over and above 23 candidates it had already announced earlier. Thus, the RLD has another 17 candidates to announce for the UP polls.