AGRA: Four-time MLA Suraj Singh Shakya , who left BJP a week ago, will now contest parliamentary polls from Etah on Babu Singh Kushwaha’s Jan Adhikar party ticket.Shakya was once the closest aide of Kalyan Singh , governor of Rajasthan and former chief minister of UP. His son Rajveer Singh is incumbent MP from Etah constituency.Speaking to TOI, Shiv Saran Kushwaha, younger brother of Jan Adhikar party’s chairperson, said, “After forming an alliance with Congress, we have decided to field Suraj Singh Shakya from Etah. He is the strongest candidate among all his rivals, as he has a clean image and he is a visionary.”Etah presently comprises of five state assembly constituencies - Kasganj, Amapur, Patiyali, Etah and Marhara. According to election commission, there were 15,77,457 voters in 2014. The constituency is primarily dominated by three lakh Lodhi Rajput voters, followed by 2.50 lakh Shakya, around 1.50 lakh Yadav and almost 1.20 lakh Muslims. The rest of the voters are Brahmins, Baniyas, Jains, Dalits and other caste and religion.According to local sources, the incumbent MP Rajveer Singh who is Lodhi Rajput will face tough competition from Suraj Singh Shakya who enjoys support from all the caste and religious communities. Shakya has been a state minister twice in BJP (CM Kalyan Singh) and SP (CM Mulayam Singh Yadav ) tenure. He was an MLA in 1991, 1993, 2002 and 2007.Speaking to TOI, septuagenarian Suraj Singh Shakya said, “The incumbent MP hardly visited his constituency in last five years. He does not even know the basic problems of the local people. Even his father, Kalyan Singh, when elected as an independent candidate in 2009, hardly interacted with local residents. The 10-year anti-incumbency will benefit us now, as people have suffered a lot.”“My focus would be to change Etah’s image from being ‘tamancha’ and country-made liquor hub to an industrial hub, and ensure connectivity with other districts,” he said.According to Agra zone police, between 2017 and 2018, the Etah police recovered 2.59 lakh litre of country-made liquor along with 18,395 litre of chemicals used for its making. In 2016, 44 men were killed in Aliganj area of Etah district for drinking hooch. The police also claimed that over 300 illegal arms factory manufacturing country-made weapons were busted.During a Tiranga yatra in Kasganj state assembly constituency, which comes under Etah Lok Sabha seat, country-made weapons were used by an unruly mob on January 26, 2018. In the incident, Abhishek Gupta, alias Chandan Gupta, was also killed by a bullet fired from a country-made weapon.

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