| Awadhesh Prasad | |
| Term Start: | 4 June 2024 |
| Constituency: | Faizabad |
| Predecessor: | Lallu Singh |
| Office1: | Member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly |
| Term Start1: | 10 March 2022 |
| Term End1: | 11 June 2024 |
| Constituency1: | Milkipur (SC) |
| Predecessor1: | Baba Gorakhnath, BJP |
| Successor1: | TBA |
| Term Start2: | 2012 |
| Term End2: | 2017 |
| Constituency2: | Milkipur (SC) |
| Predecessor2: | New constituency |
| Successor2: | Baba Gorakhnath, BJP |
| Term Start3: | 1993 |
| Term End3: | 2012 |
| Constituency3: | Sohawal (SC) |
| Predecessor3: | Ramu Priyadarshi, BJP |
| Successor3: | Delimitation |
| Term Start4: | 1985 |
| Term End4: | 1991 |
| Constituency4: | Sohawal (SC) |
| Predecessor4: | Madho Prasad, INC(I) |
| Successor4: | Ramu Priyadarshi, BJP |
| Term Start5: | 1977 |
| Term End5: | 1980 |
| Constituency5: | Sohawal (SC) |
| Predecessor5: | Hub Raj, INC |
| Successor5: | Madho Prasad, INC(I) |
| Birth Date: | 31 July 1945 |
| Birth Place: | Bikapur, United Provinces, British India |
| Party: | Samajwadi Party |
| Children: | 2 |
| Residence: | Bikapur |
| Alma Mater: | Lucknow University (LLB, 1968) DAV College, Kanpur, Agra University (MA, 1966) |
Awadhesh Prasad (born 31 July 1945) is an Indian politician serving as the Lok Sabha Member of Parliament from Faizabad and a founding member of the Samajwadi Party (SP).[1] He is presently the general secretary of the national executive of SP and he was a member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly till 4 June 2024 when he was elected as an MP. He has been a nine time MLA elected from the erstwhile Sohawal (SC) constituency in 1977, 1985, 1989, 1993, 1996, 2002 and 2007 and as of latest from Milkipur (SC) in 2012 and 2022.[2] He has become a minister for six times in the Government of Uttar Pradesh and been a cabinet minister in four of them.[1]
Prasad, who comes from Pasi Dalit community, began his political career at the age of 21. He was the Ayodhya district co-convener of the anti-Emergency Sangarsh Samiti. He was also the polling agent of the Lok Dal at Amethi during the 1977 Indian general election. He became the national secretary and was inducted into the central parliamentary board when the Samajwadi Party was founded in 1992. In the party, he has generally functioned as an organisation man since then.[1]
He became minister in the Janata Party governments of Ram Naresh Yadav and Babu Banarasi Das and in the Samajwadi Party governments of Mulayam Singh Yadav and Akhilesh Yadav.[1] He has a close association with the party president Akhilesh Yadav and was one of the few veteran leaders to have sided with him during the pre-2017 election leadership contest within the party.[3]
In the 2024 Indian general election Prasad won [4] as the Member of Parliament from the Faizabad Lok Sabha constituency.[5] This win has been seen as of deep interest within the 2024 Indian general election because it encompasses the city of Ayodhya where resides the Ram Temple which was set-up in the previous term (2019-2024). Analysts credited his win to failure of BJP's Abki Baar 400 Paar slogan and Samajwadi Party's strategy of leveraging social politics by capitalizing on the significant OBC voter base, including Kurmis and Yadavs, aligning OBCs, Dalits, and Muslims to edge out the BJP.[6]
| Year | Party | Constituency Name | Result | Votes gained | Vote share% | Margin | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1974 | bgcolor= | BKD | Sohawal | 18,879 | 34.70% | 689 | ||
| 1977 | bgcolor= | JP | 28,090 | 58.42% | 10,578 | |||
| 1980 | bgcolor= | JP(S) | 21,932 | 40.72% | 4,071 | |||
| 1985 | bgcolor= | LD | 27,373 | 46.29% | 9,147 | |||
| 1989 | bgcolor= | JD | 29,413 | 33.91% | 10,032 | |||
| 1991 | bgcolor= | JP | 22,047 | 24.90% | 9,643 | |||
| 1993 | SP | 59,115 | 51.77% | 16,496 | ||||
| 1996 | 44,399 | 35.17% | 3,407 | |||||
| 2002 | 43,398 | 35.36% | 8,156 | |||||
| 2007 | 48,624 | 33.08% | 9,871 | |||||
| 2012 | Milkipur | 73,804 | 42.24% | 34,237 | ||||
| 2017 | 58,684 | 29.77% | 28,276 | |||||
| 2022 | 103,905 | 47.99% | 13,338 | |||||
| Year | Party | Constituency Name | Result | Votes gained | Vote share% | Margin | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | SP | Akbarpur | 169,046 | 27.12% | 30,749 | ||
| 2024 | Faizabad (Ayodhya) | 554,289 | 48.59% | 47,935 | |||