ALLAHABAD: As Allahabad goes to elections today , the Bharatiya Janata Party is banking on Modi wave to open its account in the district and dent the prospects of rivals like Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party in the state assembly polls . In the 2012 assembly polls, the safforn party had failed to register a win in any of the 12 seats in Allahabad district.The saving grace was Sirathu in Kaushambi, where too BJP lost in the by-election, after the seat was vacated when Keshav Prasad Maurya was elected as Phulpur MP.However, buoyed by its success in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, wherein the party had bagged all three seats of the region including Phulpur, Allahabad and Kaushambi, the party high command is hopeful of an encore of their performance.Senior party leader, Ashish Gupta said, "The party has taken the lead in the first three phases. The conditions are looking favourable, so we may achieve our target of 265 plus seats. We are banking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's clean image to help us woo voters."Apart from three urban seats-Allahabad South, Allahabad North and Allahabad West-BJP is focusing on rural and trans-Yamuna-Ganga seats like Phulpur, Phaphamau, Meja, Karchana, Bara and Koraon. Meanwhile, BJP's alliance partner, Apna Dal, is fielding candidates in Soroan, Pratappur and Handia assembly seats. The saffron party is trying to tap into the traditional vote bank of SP and BSP in Allahabad and Kaushambi respectively, after carrying out a series of voters outreach programmes to register its presence."We are hopeful that PM Modi's rally would surely bring the desired results in assembly polls," said a senior functionary of the party on condition of anonymity.

Stay updated with all the Allahabad Latest News headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.