Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has resigned as the MLA from Uttar Pradesh’s Karhal Assembly constituency to retain the Kannauj Lok Sabha seat he won in the recently-concluded general elections, ANI reported on Wednesday.

In the 2022 state polls, Yadav had won from Karhal and become the Leader of the Opposition in Uttar Pradesh Assembly. Yadav had contested the Karhal seat after quitting as the MP from Azamgarh, from where he won in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

In the recently-concluded Lok Sabha polls, the Samajwadi Party, which is part of the Opposition INDIA bloc, emerged as the single-largest party in Uttar Pradesh, winning 37 of the 80 parliamentary seats in the state. In the 2019 general elections, the party won five seats.

The former chief minister won the party’s stronghold of Kannauj, defeating the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Subrat Pathak by more than 1.7 lakh votes.

As Yadav vacated the Leader of Opposition post in the state Assembly, the Samajwadi Party is now looking for a candidate to fill the position.

Besides Yadav, the party’s Awadhesh Prasad also resigned as an MLA after winning from the Faizabad Lok Sabha seat.

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