LEAD

BJP allocated a significant share of tickets for backwards even as it sprung a surprise by fielding chief minister Yogi Adityanath from his home turf, Gorakhpur (Urban) seat, instead of the Hindutva nerve-centre of Ayodhya as speculated, in the first list of 107 candidates for UP that it announced on Saturday.

Out of these 107 seats, barring Gorakhpur (Urban) and Sirathu, remaining 105 will go to the polls in the first two phases. As expected, deputy chief minister Keshav Maurya will contest from Sirathu in Kaushambi.

While Yogi, who has been a five-time MP from Gorakhpur, will contest an assembly election for the first time, Maurya had won from Sirathu in 2012. Both will replace sitting MLAs -- RMD Agarwal and Sheetla Prasad. The party announced candidates for 57 out of 58 seats going to the polls in the first phase, while 48 names out of 55 constituencies in the second phase were announced.

With the announcement of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, the construction of the Ram Janmabhoomi Temple in Ayodhya is being expedited further.

Work on the foundation of the temple was completed on the day of Makar Sankranti. Only two blocks of the raft foundation were left for casting, which was done on January 14 and left for a week to dry. The work of setting the stone will be the next course of action.

On Sunday, preparations for the construction of the next phase will start after performing rituals on the raft foundation.

Speaking to media, Champat Rai, general secretary of Shri Ram Janma Bhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, said that the construction work of the temple has been expedited.

Less than a month to go for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls and tensions are already running high in the poll-bound state. Three ministers of the Yogi Adityanath cabinet have quit in as many days. Speculation is rife that they could join hands with the Samajwadi Party.

The first to leave the BJP was Swami Prasad Maurya, an OBC leader who was serving as minister of labour, employment, coordination in the Yogi Adityanath government. His exit was followed by that of three other BJP MLAs - Roshanlal Verma, Brijesh Prajapati and Bhagwati Sagar.

A day after Maurya's exit from the BJP and subsequent meeting with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, UP minister Dara Singh Chauhan resigned from the Yogi Adityanath government. BJP MLAs Mukesh Verma, Vinay Shakya, Bala Prasad Awasthi and Avtar Singh Bhadana also took the cue and resigned from primary membership of the party.

In the biggest single-day increase in cases since the beginning of the pandemic, India reported nearly 2.5 lakh fresh infections on Wednesday, over 50,000 higher than the previous day’s count, even as the tally went past the 2-lakh mark for the first time since May 26.

With numbers from Tripura yet to come, Wednesday had already seen 2,46,443 new infections. The final count is likely to exceed 2.47 lakh. The previous highest increase in cases in a single day was a jump of 43,196 recorded on April 27, 2021, when the second wave was nearing its peak.

The day also saw 203 deaths (excluding Tripura) reported from across the country, the daily toll having crossed the 200 mark for the first time since October 27. Daily cases have been rising at an alarming rate. Except for Monday, when cases saw a decline, Wednesday was the 15th day since December 28 when daily cases have seen a double-digit growth. Compared to Tuesday, Wednesday saw a 26.1% rise in fresh cases.

Covid-19 infections continued to surge in the country at a slightly slower rate than seen last week, with over 1.9 lakh fresh cases reported on Tuesday, up 17% from the previous day's tally. Deaths from the virus, although still very low overall, were rising at a faster rate with each passing day.

India recorded 165 deaths on Tuesday — with data from one state awaited at the time of writing — up from 130 on the previous day. This was the highest daily toll in 41 days since 167 fatalities were reported on December 1 last year (discounting 182 deaths on December 15, when Kerala logged 125 fatalities due to the clubbing of data from several days).