The Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav on Thursday (October 8, 2026) in Ayodhya challenged Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to contest from Ayodhya in the upcoming Assembly polls, adding that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is nervous.

“If the Chief Minister who makes big claims is so confident then he should contest the election from Ayodhya himself,” said Mr. Yadav, who attended the Shrimad Bhagwat Katha held at the ancestral home of Samajwadi Party leader and former Minister Tej Narayan Pandey alias Pawan Pandey in Ayodhya. The Samajwadi Party (SP) won the Faizabad (Ayodhya) Lok Sabha seat in 2024 parliamentary elections with its candidate Awadhesh Prasad defeating the BJP nominee Lallu Singh by over 54,000 votes. 

Promising to accelerate the growth of Ayodhya, the SP leader alleged rampant demolition under BJP’s watch in the name of development. “In future, ₹40,000 will be given to our mothers and sisters every year by the SP government. If there is a Samajwadi government in the future, neither will you be discriminated against nor will your shop or house be demolished. In the future, when the Samajwadi government is formed, we will work to accelerate development so that Ayodhya gets recognition at the international level. Ego, power, discrimination, caste, high-low, untouchability are before us today. For us, the one who is Lord Shri Ram is the same as Lord Shri Krishna and the one who is Shri Krishna is the same as Shri Ram. ” added Mr. Yadav. 

Addressing the devotees present on the occasion, Mr. Yadav said that today on the holy land of Ayodhya, the birthplace of Lord Shri Ram, all the devotees are chanting Jai Radheshyam together. “This is the beauty of our society, country and culture. Elections are going to be the biggest festival of democracy, when the elections will be held, the time will come to take a decision,” he said. 

“The culture and traditions of our country is great. We have been listening to the story of Ramayana and Mahabharata since childhood. We have personally heard since childhood that the one who frees us from the bondage of existence is the Bhagwat. Today we see the society as full of bondage and suffering. Sometimes there is ego, the arrogance of power, somewhere there is the arrogance of caste and somewhere there is the arrogance of discrimination. This is the atmosphere that has been created. It is seen that there is also enmity, and untouchability.. Along with the division of pure and impure, there are many types of social discrimination. In such times, the relevance of Bhagwat Katha increases further,” added Mr. Yadav.