First the Congress fielded a candidate. The very next day, he was asked to withdraw. When he did not, he was issued a showcause notice and suspended when he refused to budge. Then ally Samajwadi Party fielded a candidate from the seat. Now, the snubbed Congress leader is contesting as an Independent from the same constituency.

The full spectrum of the Congress leadership’s flip-flops has played itself out on the befuddled rank and file of the party in Uttar Pradesh’s Phulpur, one of the 10 Assembly constituencies where bypolls are to be held on November 13. What has heightened the irony is that the seat was represented thrice by Jawaharlal Nehru, the country’s first Prime Minister, and was for long considered a family borough of the Nehru-Gandhis.

Samajwadi chief Akhilesh Yadav has fielded candidates from all 10 seats, first announcing a batch of six nominees and then fielding four others. The Congress, whose local leadership wanted to contest some seats, has decided to back the Samajwadi Party, ostensibly after Rahul Gandhi and some other members of the central leadership did not show much interest in driving a bargain.

Last week, Suresh Chandra Yadav, the Congress president of Gangapar in Phulpur in Allahabad district, was asked by party leaders to file his nomination for the by-election, sources close to him said.

“He had received several phone calls from senior state-level leaders asking him to file his nomination. The same day, Akhilesh said at a news conference that the Congress could contest from Phulpur. But the next morning, Suresh was asked to withdraw his papers. As he didn’t immediately act on the instruction, he was served a showcause notice and asked to submit his reply by October 25. Now, the party has suspended him on the charge of insubordination for six years because he didn’t submit any reply,” said a Congress leader in Allahabad, requesting anonymity.

Talking to The Telegraph over phone from Allahabad, Suresh said: “I am very much there in the fray as an Independent candidate. It is a long story — how they asked me to file nomination papers and how they asked me to withdraw. All I can say at this moment is that there are some people in the INDIA bloc who are playing into the hands of the BJP and want to help their candidate.”

The BJP has fielded Deepak Patel from Phulpur. He is the son of Keshari Devi Patel, former BJP MP from Phulpur. The Samajwadi Party has chosen Mujtaba Siddiqui, a former MLA who had lost in 2022 to the BJP candidate by only 2,700 votes. The Bahujan Samaj Party has fielded Jitendra Singh, a little-known leader.

Suresh claimed that he was the most acceptable candidate in Phulpur, adding: “I am contesting with full confidence as an Independent. There is no question of any regret. I’ll say whatever I have to say once the election is over. I don’t want to create confusion among my supporters.”

The SP and the Congress are part of the INDIA bloc.

A Congress leader in Allahabad said on the condition of anonymity: “This alliance looks so strange. Reoti Raman Singh is a close confidant of Akhilesh but his son Ujjwal Raman Singh, a former SP MLA, contested the Allahabad parliamentary seat on the Congress’s symbol in 2024 and won. It indicates two things. Either the Congress was too weak here to field a well-entrenched player from its own ranks or Akhilesh used the popularity of the Congress in Allahabad to promote his own party’s cause.”

“Our biggest strategist, Rahul Gandhi, is unable to protect his own party in his ancestor’s district. He has confused us in the process,” he added.