LUCKNOW, Oct. 11 -- Announcing the names of five candidates out of the 11 for the 2026 MLC polls in the state, Uttar Pradesh Congress president on Friday said the party will contest the Vidhan Parishad elections independently. "The party will contest the polls for teacher and graduate constituencies on its own. Since this is not a symbol-based election, there is no question of an alliance. We are taking these polls as a challenge," he said while replying to a query if the Congress would contest the polls in alliance with the Samajwadi Party like it did during the last general election. "The party has fielded Sanjay Priyadarshi from the Varanasi teacher constituency and Arvind Singh Patel from the graduate constituency. Similarly, Devmani Tiwari has been nominated as a graduate candidate from Lucknow, Vikrant Vashishtha from Meerut and Raghuraj Pal from Agra. Other candidates will be announced soon," Rai said during a press conference. Attacking the state government, he alleged: "The current dispensation in the state has failed to address problems of teachers, advocates and youths. Paper leak, lack of support to teachers, absence of old pension scheme and school mergers never got attention in the BJP government."...