Serial turncoat Afzal Ansari gets SP ticket now, set to contest after SC nod

Among the list of 11 candidates whose names the Samajwadi Party (SP) announced on Monday for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, amid seat-sharing talks with the Congress, one name is bound to raise eyebrows — Afzal Ansari. Not only is the 70-year-old a sitting Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP) MP from Ghazipur, he was sentenced to four years in April 2023 in a Gangsters Act case, and is now out on bail, with his disqualification as an MP temporarily suspended by the Supreme Court.

Ansari, the brother of gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari, has been known to jump ship ahead of polls. The one constant through his terms as five-time MLA and two-time Lok Sabha MP has been Ghazipur district in eastern UP. All his Assembly terms have been from Mohammadabad, an Assembly segment under the Ballia Lok Sabha constituency of Ghazipur district. He progressed to the Lok Sabha from the Ghazipur constituency, and is seen to still enjoy widespread popularity.

Ansari was earlier a part of the CPI, moved to the SP in 1996, jumped to the BSP in 2009, and a year later, launched the Quami Ekta Dal (QED), which he merged with the BSP in 2019. He won the last Lok Sabha election on a BSP ticket, when the SP and BSP contested together. Monday’s announcement of Ansari as the SP nominee means his this stint with the BSP is also over.

Political circles have been abuzz in Uttar Pradesh since January that SP chief Akhilesh Yadav could accommodate Afzal Ansari in the coming Lok Sabha polls on an SP ticket. Akhilesh had even attended Ansari’s daughter’s wedding in Lucknow accompanied by senior party leaders on January 4.

Speaking to The Indian Express around the time, Ansari had said that while suspending his conviction in December, the Supreme Court had