BSP won’t field 'bahubali', mafia candidates in upcoming UP Assembly elections: Mayawati, drops Mukhtar Ansari from Mau seat

Denying party ticket to jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari from UP's Mau, Mayawati announced BSP state president Bhim Rajbhar will contest from the seat next year.

New Delhi: Ahead of the high-profile Uttar Pradesh elections next year, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati on Friday (September 10) said that her party will not field 'bahubali' (strongmen) or mafia candidates in the upcoming polls.  Denying party ticket to jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari from Mau, Mayawati announced BSP state president Bhim Rajbhar will contest from the seat next year. Ansari, who represents Mau, is currently lodged in a jail in Banda, facing 52 cases in Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere, while 15 cases are in the trial stage, ANI reported.  Taking to Twitter, the former UP CM wrote in Hindi, "In upcoming assembly polls, the BSP's effort will be to not field 'bahubali' and mafia elements. So, the name of Bhim Rajbhar, the BSP UP president, has been finalised from the Mau assembly seat in place of Mukhtar Ansari.”