Anti-Emergency activist to founder-member of Samajwadi Party: Meet Awadhesh Prasad, UP's MP-elect from Faizabad

Newly elected Samajwadi Party MP from Faizabad Awadhesh Prasad is in the national limelight after he managed to win from a constituency within which the BJP's biggest poll plank of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections falls—the Ayodhya Ram temple.

Despite the BJP's massive campaigning about the Ram temple, which they claim was a dream for many for 500 years, Prasad managed to defeat the saffron party's candidate by Lallu Singh by 54,567 votes.

In a recent interview with PTI Videos, Prasad said, "The BJP did politics in the name of Ayodhya. They have worked against the dignity of Maryada Purushottam Ram."

When asked about the BJP's slogan "Jo Ram ko laaye hain hum unko layenge" (those who have brought Ram, we will bring them), Prasad told the publication "They (BJP) have not brought Ram. This was their false slogan. The public has understood this very well. No one brought Ram. Ram himself came thousands of years ago."

"Ram is in everyone's heart. He is the centre of everyone's faith. They (BJP) were doing politics in the name of Ram and have cheated the country. They have ruined the country," he further added.

Indian Express interviewed Prasad, in which he spoke about his younger days in politics. He joined former PM Chaudhry Charan Singh's party Bharatiya Kranti Dal at the age of 21 and fought his first assembly elections from Ayodhya's Sohawal in 1974.

Prasad was a co-convener of Sangharsh Samiti, an anti-Emergency organisation, and was jailed for protesting against the Indira Gandhi government.

“My only regret is that I could not see my mother (in her last moments). It was during Emergency and I was in jail at the time. Her body was kept for five days but I could not have the last darshan of Amma," he told the publication.

Prasad, the publication revealed, is the only Dalit leader who has won the LS polls from an unreserved seat.

Later when Charan Singh's party broke up, Prasad joined the Mulayam Singh Yadav camp and became one of the founder members of the Samajwadi Party. He is a nine-time MLA.

During the LS poll campaigns across the country, a video when viral in which Akhilesh Yadav referred to Prasad as a "former MLA". When Prasad went on to correct Akhilesh, the SP president said, "I'm referring to you as a former MLA because you're now going to become an MP" to loud cheers from the crowd.

Thanks to the people of Faizabad, Akhilesh was proved right as results started coming in on June 4.

With PTI inputs