How BJP used Mathura violence to put heat on SP ahead of UP polls

When images of violence and news of the killing of an SP and SHO in Mathura flashed on the screens, it shook everybody.

BJP was the first to move in, and despite the initial embarrassment of its MP Hema Malini's Twitter faux pas, it blazed guns on the ruling Samajwadi party government.

How close this can be construed as a precursor to the UP Assembly elections in 2017 was made clear by what was to follow.

First BJP sent its national secretary Shrikant Sharma, who is also a local resident of Mathura, to the spot, where he singlehandedly fielded questions on Hema Malini's absence, and kept the questions alive on how Ram Vriksha Yadav became a cult reader, and had a free reign to run his kingdom.

In the interim, local MP Hema Malini, who was shooting in Mumbai rushed to Mathura. She flew to Delhi first and was in Mathura by evening. Initially, she appeared reserved, then she too began to hit out on the issue of law and order in Uttar Pradesh. She asked why the media was not questioning the Akhilesh Yadav government. The BJP formed a committee of three MPs and two MLAs and dispatched it to Jawahar Bagh area, and to assess the situation first-hand.

In a rally in Kanpur, BJP president Amit Shah challenged UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav, and asked him to take action against his uncle Shivpal Yadav, who, BJP alleged, is behind the Mathura violence.

Home minister Rajnath Singh, too, swung into action. In a BJP rally, he taunted the SP government and said they should order a CBI probe if it has nothing to hide.

Union minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti landed at the spot along with a BJP delegation and became embroiled in slanging match with UP police officers who had stopped them from going forward.

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Strangely, the main opposition party in UP, Bahujan Samaj Party, kept a fair distance from the situation. In press conferences, Mayawati only pressed for an independent probe.

UP BJP leaders got a sense that they were able to successfully push their political opponents on the back foot. One local politician told me that he felt buoyed by the all-round coordination between the state and the central leadership. The BJP came out looking like the only party which was seen as protesting against this gunda raj and cult of Ram Vriksha Yadav.

They also point out that when party president Amit Shah singled out SP as their main opposition in Uttar Pradesh, instead of BSP, it was an attempt to subtly send a message out to a section of fence-sitters and upper caste voters that BJP was contending for the top post this elections.

BJP state leaders feel the Mathura violence has given them a plank to unofficially launch their UP campaign.

A senior Congress leader who visited Jawahar Bagh twice, conceded in private, BJP has had a good run with the Mathura violence narrative. He said this was also a missed opportunity for Congress and its state leaders to take on SP, who chose to send Nirmal Khatri, someone the media barely recognises. "Where was Raj Babbar or Jatin Prasad or any other recognisable face?" The very fact that a senior police officers was killed, who happens to be a Brahmin, he says, would have helped Congress gain political ground. But the party is not thinking. Everybody is busy chalking out strategies.

Also read: UP government may have faked Mathura violence kingpin Ram Vriksh's 'death'

Though Samajwadi Party leaders limited themselves by taking on Amit Shah, to restrain from taking political mileage out of the situation, it was clear they were rattled by BJP's onslaught.

The ripples Mathura violence has caused rang so clear for SP, it pushed its latest entrant Amar Singh to say the BJP shouldn't politicise the violence in Mathura. "These very forces were silent on sponsored violence in Gujarat; murderous attack on Congress leader VC Shukla in Chhattisgarh. If chief ministerss then had resigned then Akhilesh Yadav can also be asked to resign."

Notwithstanding criticism from their political opponents, BJP leaders it seems are all too pleased with themselves with the way Mathura violence panned out for the party. They feel it has galvanised its state leaders and cadre.

If Mathura has sounded the UP poll bugle, its BJP 1 and SP 0.