Adjacent to the Uttar Pradesh University of Medical Sciences campus stands an unfinished building sheltering a few buffaloes. What the building was meant for is anybody’s guess. What they know for sure is construction stopped midway after the Akhilesh Yadav government’s term ended in 2017.
Saifai, the native place of Samajwadi Party (SP) patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, presents a model of focused infrastructure development with government funding. Mulayam and his son Akhilesh have been instrumental in creating urban facilities in this agrarian belt of Saifai that falls under the Mainpuri Lok Sabha constituency.
After Mulayam’s death in 2022, Akhilesh’s wife Dimple Yadav won the bypoll with a margin of 2.88 lakh votes. This election, Dimple is pitted against state tourism minister Jaiveer Singh Thakur (BJP).
People in this SP bastion say the ruling dispensation has little chance against Dimple.
Ajay Yadav, who runs Shivani Car Service Centre in Saifai, 228km from Lucknow, says the unfinished building on the Uttar Pradesh University of Medical Sciences campus was part of the medical college.
The unfinished block of the medical college in Saifai. Basant Kumar Mohanty
The Yogi Adityanath government stopped giving funds, he adds.
“All the development you see here is because of Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family. Many development projects have been stalled after the SP government was replaced in the state. We will continue to vote for cycle (the SP symbol) for further development of the area,” Ajay says, adding that agro-based industries should be set up in the region to boost employment and locals should also be prioritised for non-technical jobs in such factories.
Gulab Singh, a 65-year-old who came from Badaun to consult doctors at the medical college, called it “just like AIIMS”. “There are a lot of doctors here and it’s air-conditioned. I did not go to the district hospital in Badaun and travelled 200km here for better treatment. The entire region has benefited. That is why people vote for Netaji (Mulayam’s) family,” Singh says.
But there is not much employment opportunity in the area, rues Rohit Kumar Balmiki, a second-year BCom student. Saifai, he says, has a stadium with facilities for cricket, hockey, football, kabaddi and badminton yet no state- or national-level match is held here.
“There are no employment opportunities in this area. If some IPL matches could be held there, a lot of people will come. The local people will get some opportunities to earn. Now I am pursuing studies and then I can start a hotel or something,” says
Balmiki, whose widowed mother is an attendant at the medical college.
In Mainpuri city, too, constituents say Dimple will win the seat.
Pankaj Pathak, who identifies himself as a BJP supporter and admires Narendra Modi’s policies, also says so. “I am a BJP supporter. Modi sarkar has done well. It will come to power again. But in Mainpuri, Dimple bhabhi will win. The victory margin may be less than a lakh this time though,” he says.
Yadavs are in the majority in the constituency, Pathak adds, followed by the Shakyas, another OBC group, and people of both communities are supporting Dimple.
Upadesh Yadav of Koshma village under the Karhal Assembly segment — of which Akhilesh is the sitting MLA — said development only happens when the SP government is in power.
“There is no government engineering college in Mainpuri. The SP government proposed to set up one but it did not make any headway under the Yogi government,” Upadesh says. “Mainpuri is the Samajwadi Party’s bastion. The party will not lose the seat.”
And so is the common refrain — the Modi government’s schemes are good but BJP has little chance in Mainpuri.
- Mainpuri votes today
