Kairana: Ganna, the sugarcane crop, is threatening to overshadow any talk of "Jinnah" and sour the BJP’s chances in Monday’s test against a combined Opposition in a corner of western Uttar Pradesh.
After the shock setbacks in Gorakhpur and Phulpur in March, the Kairana Lok Sabha by-election has become crucial for the BJP.
It’s also critical for its rivals, offering a test, days after the Karnataka drama, of whether a united Opposition can unsettle the BJP in its backyard.
The Rashtriya Lok Dal has fielded Tabassum Hasan, backed by the Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and the Congress in a seat the BJP would be trying to retain after the death of its sitting MP, Hukum Singh.
Hukum’s daughter Mriganka Singh is the BJP candidate. The result will be known on May 31.
The BJP had swept western Uttar Pradesh in the 2014 general election, bolstered by the communal riots in Muzaffarnagar the previous September that had pitted the two dominant communities, Muslims and Jats, against each other.
Kairana is in Shamli district, which neighbours Muzaffaranagar and suffered in the riots. But this time, the voters are not biting, at least so far.
On Thursday, chief minister Yogi Adityanath dragged Muhammad Ali Jinnah into the campaign and invoked the Muzaffarnagar riots, prompting charges of trying to polarise the voters.
He played on the rhyme between " ganna" – a key election issue in the constituency — and "Jinnah" to say: "Ganna is our priority but we won’t allow anybody to hang Jinnah’s picture."
It was an allusion to the recent controversy over a Jinnah portrait at the Aligarh Muslim University students’ union hall.
But an agitated Jat youth in Shamli, Dhiraj Chaudhary, said the voters would not "bite the Hindu-Muslim lollipop this time" and cited an economic reason.
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