Yogi Adityanath is contesting from Gorakhpur where he is the head priest of the Gorakhpur mutt
Yogi Adityanath is contesting his first state election in Uttar Pradesh. For the five-time MP, this election may be more important than any he has fought before.
In 2017, Yogi Adityanath vaulted to the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister's post in the most unexpected way. The BJP had never announced a Chief Ministerial candidate.
After the BJP's landslide win, not many would have thought that the saffron-robed monk, the "outsider" known for his communally charged speeches, would have the top job, or would even complete a full term.
But five years on, Yogi Adityanath remains firmly entrenched, despite struggles like the second wave of Covid or dissidence in the ranks, and is campaigning alongside Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who even used the term "UP+Yogi - Upyogi (Useful)" in one of his rallies for the 2022 election.
Yogi Adityanath is contesting from Gorakhpur, where he is head priest at the Gorakhpur mutt, a temple that has a strong influence over the eastern part of the state.
The 49-year-old priest-politician's nomination was a challenge thrown at rivals who were not contesting the polls either. His main challenger Akhilesh Yadav, a Samajwadi Party MP, followed soon, announcing his own debut state contest.
Yogi Adityanath's re-election campaign has been bumpy; he has lost a chunk of backward caste leaders to Akhilesh Yadav, led by Swami Prasad Maurya, a significant OBC (Other Backward Class) leader in eastern UP.
To undercut the loss, the BJP got in Akhilesh Yadav's sister-in-law Aparna Yadav and RPN Singh, a Rahul Gandhi aide and a former royal who could impact the election math in eastern UP.
For the BJP, retaining Uttar Pradesh is a giant test as it hurtles towards the 2024 national election in which it will seek a third straight term. But this UP election will be a referendum on Yogi Adityanath even more than that of the BJP. His political future in the BJP is at stake.
If he wins, it will be a huge boost for one of India's most polarising politicians.
In the last five years, especially during the Covid pandemic, there have been multiple questions on Yogi Adityanath's administrative acumen.
The biggest criticism of Adityanath has been his perceived autocratic style of functioning, especially when it came to his critics and rivals, or crushing potential scandals while taking a more lenient approach when it came to his own party men.
For example, the high-handedness witnessed in the Hathras case when a young rape victim was cremated forcibly, without her family present, and in cases slapped against journalists who reported critically on the UP government.
In sharp contrast, a long leash was extended to the former BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar, who was accused of rape, as well as to BJP leaders and their relatives accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri incident where farmers were run over last year, days after a Union Minister made a provocative speech threatening farmers with violence.
Team Yogi, however, projects him as a leader with a clean image and a firm hand on law and order compared to the alleged lawlessness on the Samajwadi Party's watch. The government, however, fought allegations of "encounters" by cops, like that of an arrested gangster being brought to UP.
Born Ajay Mohan Bisht in Garhwal in what is now neighbouring Uttarakhand, Yogi Adityanath was the second of seven children.
He graduated from the Garhwal university. In the 1990s, he left home to join the Ram temple movement. He joined the Gorakhpur mutt as a disciple of Mahant Avaidyanath. When the Mahant died in 2014, Yogi Adityanath succeeded him as the head of the mutt, which has a huge influence over eastern UP.
He was elected the youngest MP in 1998 from Gorakhpur and won every election till 2014.
Though he joined the BJP in 1991, Yogi Adityanath, after his first election victory, launched his Hindu Yuva Vahini that pursued a more aggressive brand of Hindutva. In 2017, the outfit fielded its own candidates, signaling trouble for the BJP by competing for Hindu votes. Anticipating more trouble from Yogi and his ragtag band of followers, the BJP made its decision.
Soon after he took charge, his government wrapped up several cases in which he was named. His own 2014 election affidavit refers to specific cases of hate speech and rioting.
As Chief Minister and the BJP's star campaigner in many elections, Yogi Adityanath has developed a style of transmitting the same divisive themes but using pronouns, without specifying his target.
With the BJP going into the election facing farmers' anger over the three laws that were withdrawn after an 11-month protest, Yogi Adityanath has tried to draw the focus back to his unabashedly divisive agenda. Last year, he escalated the "Us and Them" rhetoric by referring to Akhilesh Yadav's father Mulayam Singh Yadav as "abbajaan" (Urdu for father).
He followed it up with another controversial comment on "80 versus 20" backing his party in UP, which was interpreted as a reference to Hindus versus Muslims.
His Twitter timeline is awash in with communally divisive posts. There are references to "danga" or riots, "Abbajaan, mafia" and "palayan" or migration.