Congress wants around 125 seats, but the Samajwadi Party is said to be thinking of 60-65
New Delhi: Congress is gearing up for some hard bargaining with the Samajwadi Party (SP) before the next Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. Party insiders told NDTV the target is about 125 seats.
Priyanka Gandhi, the party’s general secretary, is set to be the main face in the talks with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav. She also ran the Congress campaign in 2022, when the party went solo and ended up with only two seats.
Behind Closed Doors
On Monday, Priyanka sat down with UP Congress leaders for a three-hour meeting on seat allocation. Nearly 175 seats came up for discussion. Congress has put them in three buckets: about 100 in “Category A,” 40-50 in “Category B,” and 25-35 in “Category C.”
She will meet the state leaders again this week. After that, Congress may hand the SP a list of 125 to 150 seats. Insiders say the plan is to close the deal by November.
The Congress Wishlist
The list leans on numbers from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls and the 2017 Assembly elections. The party also wants to fight at least one Assembly seat in every Lok Sabha constituency.
Fighting alongside the SP in 2024, Congress did better than many expected. It won six of the 17 seats it contested, led in 38 Assembly segments and finished second in 42 more. All 80 of those are on the wishlist.
Seats tied to leaders like Ajay Rai, Ajay Lallu, Supriya Shrinate and Nadeem Javed are also included. On top of that, Congress wants Amethi, Raebareli and Saharanpur seats now held by SP MLAs, plus around a dozen more that the SP won.
Strongholds on Paper
Amethi and Rae Bareli are often called Congress strongholds because Gandhi family members have represented them in Parliament. At the Assembly level, though, the story is different.
In 2022, Congress failed to win any of Amethi’s five Assembly seats. The BJP won three, the SP one, and a BJP-backed independent one. In Rae Bareli, the SP took four of five and the BJP one. Congress got nothing.
What the SP Wants
Both parties say they want an alliance, but the SP isn’t budging easily. Sources say Akhilesh Yadav doesn’t want to give Congress more than 60-65 seats. He keeps stressing “winnability,” meaning how likely a candidate is to actually win.
Yadav has already started locking in candidates and is looking to contest roughly 350 of the state’s 403 seats. On the other side, Congress UP in-charge Rajendra Pal Gautam has said the party should get no less than 150.
A Reshuffle to Please the SP
Congress recently changed its state team, which looks like a nod to SP’s concerns. Aradhana Misra, a three-time MLA, replaced Ajay Rai as state chief, reportedly because she gets along well with Akhilesh Yadav. MP Imran Masood became working president, a pick meant to reach out to Muslim voters, who make up nearly 18 percent of the state.
What Next
The gap is big: Congress asks for 125-150 seats while the SP is thinking of 60-65. Talks are likely to be tough, though both sides want to wrap up by November.
Quick Glossary
- Seat-sharing: A deal among allies on who contests which seat.
- Winnability: A candidate’s real chance of winning.
- Assembly segment: One of the state assembly seats inside a Lok Sabha constituency.
