UP assembly bypolls: SP, Congress train guns over wolf attacks in state

Lucknow: The Samajwadi Party and the Congress are gearing up for bypolls to 10 assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh, with the INDIA bloc partners targeting the state government over its "undemocratic" working style, "collapse" of law and order and the recent spate of wolf attacks.

The bypolls, the schedule for which is yet to be announced, were necessitated by the election of the incumbent MLAs to the Lok Sabha and the disqualification of one legislator.

Leaders of the two parties, which contested the Lok Sabha elections in an alliance in Uttar Pradesh, have confirmed that they would contest the bypolls "unitedly".

Samajwadi Party chief spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary told PTI, "The government has failed on this front (stopping wolf attacks). It has made people of the entire state insecure. We are going to raise this (issue)." "The government's style of working is not democratic. They have not done any development and they want to remain in government," he said.

Echoing the Samajwadi Party leader, Ajay Rai -- the Congress' state unit chief -- told PTI that the government failed to control the wolf-attack situation and the "terror" was moving towards the cities.

"The other issues plaguing the state are the collapse of law and order, fake encounters, rising inflation and unemployment," he said.

The BJP, on the other hand, said the state government was making every effort to resolve the wolf-attack problem.

Eight people, seven of them children, were killed and about three dozen injured in alleged wolf attacks in Bahraich district in the last two months, official figures show.

The district's Mahsi tehsil has recorded a series of wolf attacks since March. The frequency of attacks rose during the monsoon from July.

Four wolves have been captured but the attacks still continue, leading to experts suggesting that the real "man eaters" had not been caught.

There were also reports of suspected animal attacks in neighbouring Sitapur district. On September 2, three women in a village were injured in attacks by unidentified animals. While locals claimed that the women were attacked by wolves, officials of the forest department, which collected animal samples and footprints, suspected that jackals were behind the attacks.

On Saturday, two children and five men were injured in alleged jackal attacks in two villages in the Jehanabad area of Pilibhit district.

Thermal drones and cameras have been installed to capture the wolves. The forest department has formed teams of officers and shooters for day-and-night search operations.

Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary, the BJP's state chief, told PTI, "If needed, stringent actions will also be taken." However, he did not specify what he meant by "stringent action".

Responding to the Congress and the Samajwadi Party's attacks on the government, the BJP's state spokesperson Aalok Verma told PTI, "Be it the wolves of the jungles or the wolves of society, dangerous animals cannot be allowed to roam freely." "Both the Samajwadi Party and the Congress support the wolves of society (criminals). The Samajwadi Party supports them directly while the Congress supports them indirectly," Verma said.

Meanwhile, Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary said the BJP was yet to finalise the seat-share agreement with its allies.

Of the 10 seats where the bypolls would need to be conducted, one was held by the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and one by the NISHAD party.

Congress state chief Rai, confirming that it would contest the bypolls with the Samajwadi Party, said, "We will contest the bypolls as part of the INDIA bloc. We have sought five seats held by the BJP and its allies. The final seat-share pact is yet to be finalised." The Samajwadi Party's Rajendra Chaudhary said there was an understanding that "we will contest the bypolls together".

"The party's national president (Akhilesh Yadav) will be generous in this issue (seat share). Wherever they (Congress) think they can win, those seats will be given to them," he said.

The seat-share formula is yet to be finalised but there is still time for the bypolls, he added.

The seats that will go to the bypolls are Karhal, Milkipur, Katehari, Kundarki, Ghaziabad, Khair, Meerapur, Phulpur, Majhawan and Sisamau.

The Sisamau seat fell vacant following the disqualification of Samajwadi Party MLA Irfan Solanki after he was sentenced to jail in a criminal case. The remaining seats were vacated after the election of the incumbent MLAs to the Lok Sabha.

Of the 10 seats, the Samajwadi Party won Karhal, Milkipur, Katehari, Kundarki and Sisamau in the 2022 polls while Meerapur was bagged by the RLD, which had contested the elections in an alliance with the Akhilesh Yadav-led party.

The RLD is now a constituent of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The Ghaziabad, Khair and Phulpur seats were won by the BJP while Majhawan went to its ally the NISHAD party.

The BJP has 251 MLAs in the 403-member House while the opposition Samajwadi Party has 105. BJP allies Apna Dal (Sonelal) and the NISHAD party have 13 and five MLAs, respectively.

The RLD and the Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party -- both NDA partners -- have eight and six MLAs, respectively.

The Congress and the Jansatta Dal (Loktantrik) have two MLAs each while the Bahujan Samaj Party has one member in the House.