In Yadav bastions won by BJP last time, a reconsolidation around Mulayam’s nephews

Esar Rizvi, 32, and friend Mohammad Faizuddin, 34, have devised a test to determine whom to vote for this time in the Firozabad Lok Sabha seat. They are making rounds of the election offices of both the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), located 300 metres apart in Firozabad town, to see “which party treats us, and hence Muslim voters, better”.

At the BSP office, the two are leaving when candidate Chowdhary Basheer arrives, and appeals to both friends to vote for him.

Basheer’s rival and the SP candidate is a nephew of the late Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akshaya Yadav.

In the internecine battle within the Mulayam family, Akshaya’s father Ram Gopal Yadav has mostly been at odds with his powerful cousin and Mulayam’s brother Shivpal Yadav. Now, withMulayam having passed away and with the SP battling a powerful BJP, the family has forged a tentative peace. This, at the cost of fielding as many as five family members in the Lok Sabha polls – including SP chief Akhilesh andwife Dimple, Akhilesh’s cousin Dharmendra Yadav, and Akshaya and Shivpal’s son Aditya.

If a win for Akshaya in Firozabad is crucial for Ram Gopal, who is not really a grassroots man, to retain his footing in the party, Shivpal has staked all on Aditya’s fight in Badaun, having forced the party to drop him as candidate and give the ticket to his son.

Both the seats vote on May 7.

There is another undercurrent to the contest in this traditional SP bastion. In 2019, when Akshaya contested from Firozabad, he had lost to the BJP after a rebellious Shivpal joined the fray as a nominee of his short-lived Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party Lohia (PSP-L). In 2022, the PSP-L merged with the SP.

Ram Gopal has parked himself in Firozabad to ensure Akshaya, 37, faces no