Ajay Rai had begun his political journey with the BJP's students' wing (File)
The Congress has named its UP chief Ajay Rai as the candidate from the Varanasi Lok Sabha constituency in its fourth list for the upcoming elections. Of the 17 candidates on the list, nine are for UP.
This is Mr Rai's third direct contest against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the general elections after 2014 and 2019. He had lost both times to PM Modi, who is seeking a historic third term with a massive single-party mandate for the BJP.
In 2014, PM Modi won with over 56% vote share, while Mr Rai managed to get around 75,000 votes. Arvind Kejriwal had come in second with a margin of over 3.5 lakh votes.
In 2019, the battle for Varanasi was a three-way contest between PM Narendra Modi, Shalini Yadav of the Samajwadi Party, and Ajay Rai of the Congress. PM Modi again with a vote share of over 63%. Ms Yadav got the second spot with around 18% vote share, while Mr Rai managed to get around 14% of the votes.
Varanasi has traditionally been a BJP stronghold with a party candidate being elected every time since 1991, except in 2004 when Rajesh Kumar Mishra of the Congress won.
Incidentally, Mr Rai, a local strongman, began his political journey with the BJP's students' wing and won three UP assembly terms between 1996 and 2007. However, in 2009, when he was denied a Lok Sabha ticket by the BJP, he switched to the Samajwadi Party but lost the elections. Three years later, he joined the Congress.
Besides Mr Rai, the Congress has fielded his newest entrant - Kunwar Danish Ali - from UP's Amroha.
Ramnath Sikarwar will face BJP's Raj Kumar Chahar in Fatehpur Sikri, Imran Masood, who returned to the Congress fold after moving to the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party, will fight from Saharanpur, and Dalit leader PL Punia's son Tanuj will fight from Barabanki, which is currently being represented in parliament by BJP's Upendra Singh Rawat.
Former junior minister Pradeep Jain Aditya has been named from Jhansi, while Alok Mishra will contest from Kanpur.