“Akhilesh huye farar, Nirahua datal rahe” (‘Akhilesh Yadav absconded, Nirahua stood his ground’). This is how Bhojpuri actor Amrapali Dubey celebrated the victory of co-actor Dinesh Lal Yadav Nirhaua in the recent Azamgarh Lok Sabha poll. The earthy song that became the leitmotif of Mr. Nirahua’s election campaign referred to the fact that Mr. Nirahua, who was trounced by the Samajwadi Party (SP) president in 2019, waited for his time and when Mr. Yadav vacated the seat for the Karhal Assembly seat, he defeated Mr. Yadav’s cousin, Dharmendra Yadav, in a close fight, denting the Yadav vote bank of the Mulayam Singh Yadav clan.
In the process, Mr. Nirahua has become the third Bhojpuri superstar to be a Member of Parliament on a Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) ticket, the others being Ravi Kishan from Gorakhpur and Manoj Tiwari from northeast Delhi. After the victory, posters of Ganga Jamuna SaraswatI, a 2013 film that featured all three actors, went viral. In fact, the first thing that Mr. Nirahua did after the victory was to thank his peers for their support.
“This is a unique feat, not matched by any other film industry and would help in developing the cultural heritage of the region,” an elated Mr. Kishan, who considers himself senior to the other two actors, said. “We were close to different parties but the Prime Minister Modi carefully worked on us, followed our work, and brought us into the party fold.”
