Akhilesh Yadav targets BJP after Tej Bahadur Yadav’s Varanasi nomination is rejected

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Thursday hit out at the Bharatiya Janata Party, a day after the nomination of Tej Bahadur Yadav, the SP’s candidate against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Varanasi, was rejected.

The rejected nomination

Tej Bahadur’s papers were turned down over alleged discrepancies in both sets of nomination documents he had filed. He had first entered the race as an independent before the SP made him its candidate against Modi. He had been dismissed from the Border Security Force in 2017 after raising questions about the quality of food given to soldiers.

Akhilesh asked whether speaking up about soldiers’ food counted as indiscipline worthy of dismissal, and questioned why soldiers lived in poor conditions when so much was being spent on defence. He said the BJP talked about nationalism, and that his party would back Tej Bahadur’s decision to challenge the rejection in the Supreme Court.

Military links

The SP chief said he understood the hardships of soldiers and their families. He said he had studied at a military school for many years, that several of his schoolmates had been killed on duty and that his wife came from a military family. He asked how many members of BJP leaders’ families had joined the armed forces, and said his party did not advertise what it had done for the forces.

Background

His comments came a day after Modi, at a rally near Ayodhya, said the SP, the BSP and the Congress had a record of being soft on terror and could not provide the strong government India needed.

Terrorism and national security have been central themes of the campaign. BJP leaders have highlighted the surgical strikes on terror bases in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir as proof of the government’s commitment, while opposition parties have accused the Prime Minister of claiming undue credit. The SP now appears set to make Tej Bahadur’s case a campaign issue.

See also: Samajwadi Party and our constituency pages.

Originally published on 2 May 2019. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.

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