Lately, every election in Uttar Pradesh (UP), be it for a single or multiple seats, has turned into a do-or-die battle for political parties; or at least that’s the way the parties seem to be going about the by-polls.

There was a time, perhaps until the mid-2000s, when chief ministers, cutting across party lines, delegated the campaigning for by-polls to the local leadership and monitored things from Lucknow. The trend of late has been of CMs leading from the front as they believe that their personal, and political, prestige is at stake.

Political analysts recall how once the Samajwadi Party (SP) founder-president Mulayam Singh Yadav had reprimanded his son Akhilesh Yadav for campaigning in a by-poll, soon after becoming chief minister and then losing the seat too.

Even chief ministers and leaders like Kalyan Singh, Rajnath Singh and Ram Prakash Gupta or prior to that ND Tiwari, and Vir Bahadur Singh used to dismiss queries on their plans to campaign for by-polls, saying their parties have competent leaders who would lead the poll rallies and meetings. Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati, on the other hand, rarely even contested by-polls, let alone campaigns. But now, in a charged political scenario, even Mayawati has fielded candidates on all nine seats.

As UP heads for the battle for nine assembly seats on November 20 -- which numerically will make no difference to the health of the ruling BJP or main opposition, the SP -- Yogi has not only himself gone on a poll campaign blitzkrieg but has deployed an army of ministers, MLAs and party........

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