BJP MP Yogi Adityanath BJP MP Yogi Adityanath

Even as the BJP faces allegations of creating communal divide in Uttar Pradesh, the party has appointed firebrand leader Yogi Adityanath as its star campaigner for crucial elections scheduled next month in the state.

BJP president Amit Shah, during his visit to Lucknow, had reportedly shortlisted three leaders to take care of the UP campaign - state president Laxmikant Bajpai and former Chief Minister Kalyan Singh being the other two. Kalyan Singh, now made the Governor of Rajasthan, will stay off the campaign.

Why is the announcement of Adityanath leading UP campaign controversial?

The announcement of Adityanath leading the UP campaign came a day after a provocative video of him exhorting Hindu men to marry 100 Muslim women if one Hindu woman is forcibly converted surfaced.

"If they take one Hindu girl, we will take 100 Muslims girls," the MP from Gorakhpur is seen as saying to a crowd of about a thousand people in the undated video posted on YouTube.

Asked by Headlines Today to confirm if he indeed made those remarks, the firebrand BJP leader said, "I owe no clarification to anybody on this matter."

Last month, he created a huge controversy with his speech in Parliament where he called on Hindus to take matters in their hands and accused opposition Congress of working on Pakistan's agenda. Adityanath is also facing charges of inciting communal tension in his constituency Gorakhpur.

When are the bypolls scheduled in Uttar Pradesh?

Adityanath is expected to address meetings in the 10 Assembly seats and the Lok Sabha seat of Mainpuri. Of the 10 seats going for bypolls, four - Saharanpur Nagar, Bijnor, Thakurdwara and Noida - fall in western UP which has witnessed a series of communal incidents recently.

The bypolls will be held on September 13 and counting of votes on September 16.