Lately, two of her trusted officers have been visiting the districts where the by-elections are to be held, trying to gather feedback on the local administration from the grassroots and passing instructions for removing the shortcomings and eliminating corruption.

The task assigned to the Additional Cabinet Secretary Vijay Shankar Pandey and Principal Secretary (Home) Kunwar Fateh Bahadur is to conduct “a district-wise review of the law and order situation, besides development projects” across the state.

In the initial stage, they are concentrating on the districts which are going to have the by-elections.

They visit local hospitals, Ambedkar villages, PDS shops, police stations, look into the functioning of various schemes, construction of rural roads and ponds to get a feel of the situation on the ground. They meet villagers to find out what is wrong, address meetings of officers and report directly to the Chief Minister.

Mayawati is obviously keen to make an impact on voters as an administrator. After the Lok Sabha elections, 13 Assembly seats fell vacant due to the resignation of MLAs.

The Ferozabad Lok Sabha seat was vacated by Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav, who was elected from two seats and decided to retain Kannauj.

Sources in the office of Chief Electoral Officer said all by-elections may be held before September 2. The MLAs of Malihabad, Moradabad West, Bidhuna and Morena had resigned from the Assembly in the first week of March and the by-elections must be held within six months of the vacancy arising in these constituencies.

In all likelihood, the Election Commission may hold other by-elections with these four, said the sources.

In the last fortnight, the two officers have visited Firozabad, Varanasi, Jaunpur, Jhansi, Etawah, and Deoria districts. On Monday, they were in Auraiya district in which Bidhuna Assembly seat has fallen vacant after the resignation of MLA Dhani Ram Verma, whose son Mahesh had contested against Akhilesh Yadav in Kannauj Lok Sabha seat.

The officers began their exercise from eastern UP’s Varanasi district.

The Kolasala Assembly seat in Varanasi district fell vacant due to BJP MLA Ajay Rai’s decision to contest the Lok Sabha polls as SP nominee from the Varanasi parliamentary seat.

The BSP had fielded don-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari for the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat where BJP’s Murli Manohar Joshi won.

During the campaign, Mayawati had called Ansari “gareebon ka masiha”.