All that Congress will do to go down fighting this UP elections

It was September 1990 and holidays were suddenly declared in schools in Lucknow like in many other parts of the country.

Still in junior school with no worries about missed classes and with some of my cousins being packed off to our house in a safe government locality, I had nothing much to complain about.

We occasionally heard our parents talk about the tension in the city, demonstrations by youngsters, attempts at self immolation by students and words like "Mandal report" and "quota", but like most children of my age, I was far removed from the political changes that the times were forcing in Uttar Pradesh.

Two years later, schools were again shut down, this time during the winters. Still more cousins were sent to our place as words like Babri Masjid and Ayodhya resonated.

In our sheltered government colony existence the only way we sensed tension building up in the city was when we stepped out to play with friends in the evening with the same set of instructions from our parents - do not step out of the colony premises at any cost and stick to your friends. A churning in the political landscape of Uttar Pradesh was taking place, much to our ignorance.

After the exit of VP Singh from the Congress in 1987 and the formation of the Janta Dal the ground literally shifted from under the feet of the Congress.

Combined with the Mandal-Kamandal phase, it affected a seismic change in Uttar Pradesh. For a state that was once its pocket borough, the Congress was reduced to a peripheral role. Ever since, the Congress has been reduced to an also ran in Uttar Pradesh.

Three decades down the line, as I set off to cover the Congress yatra ahead of the Assembly elections, it is striking how the nature of politics during the Mandal-Kamandal phase that almost wiped out this national party from Uttar Pradesh is giving it hope for a resurgence of sorts this time around.

The Congress believes the jolts of the early 1990s in Uttar Pradesh has taught it some vital lessons and it is ready to rectify them.

Caste politics

It was in the early 1990s that the Congress lost its traditional vote base in Uttar Pradesh - the Brahmins.

The issues of reservation and Ram mandir pushed the Brahmins towards the BJP initially and then briefly to the BSP when Mayawati experimented with social engineering in 2007.

Losing the 11 per cent Brahmin votes proved costly for the Congress that has been unable to make its presence felt in the state for 30 years barring the lone success in the 2009 general elections.

So this time the party is making a fresh, and some believe a desperate, attempt at getting the Brahmins back into its fold.

Political strategist Prashant Kishor's push for having a Brahmin chief ministerial face finally met with success. In a clear departure from norm, the party actually announced Uma Shankar Dikshit's daughter-in-law Sheila Dikshit as its chief ministerial candidate.

So pressing was the need for a Brahmin CM candidate that the 78-year-old Sheila was roped in despite her reported "apprehensions" on it being too late and her age.

On the first day of the three-day "27 saal, UP behaal" yatra, I caught up with her in Hapur in western UP. The 60km stretch was covered by the party in over five hours.

She looked a little pulled down already and was unusually irritable. Though running fever, she agreed to take some questions before heading off to Gajraula.

I asked her whether her nomination was based on competence or caste. Pat came a reply, "That question should be addressed to the party, not me."

When I probed further, she told me she had been assigned a job and was will do it, adding "one can't start with apprehensions".

She may have seemed like a reluctant soldier but her last few words caught my fancy. One can't start with apprehensions and that is perhaps why the Congress is busy convincing itself that its strategy will work.

Communal re-balancing

The demolition of the Babri Masjid saw the Muslims moving away from the Congress too and they found an alternative in Mulayam Singh Yadav's political outfit Samajwadi Party formed the same year as the demolition - 1992.

Many blamed the Congress government of PV Narasimha Rao at the Centre for turning a blind eye to the brewing unrest in the state in the run up to the Babri Masjid demolition.

Others blamed Rajiv Gandhi for the "shilanyas" that lay the foundation for the ugly tussle. As a result, the Congress suffered with an 18 per cent Muslim population drifting away from it.

So when Ghulam Nabi Azad, the new party in-charge for Uttar Pradesh tells me that "you will find all kinds of people in the bus... all religions... all castes", the message is not lost on anyone.

A Brahmin CM face combined with a credible Muslim leader could help the Congress kill the ghosts of the past.

Azad looked upbeat as he spoke to us; he exuded confidence. The stress of the figuratively bumpy bus ride in western Uttar Pradesh on a hot and humid day did not show on his face.

He cheerfully greeted us even as hordes of people continued to mill around him and a bunch of flies tailed us everywhere. He admitted, "There are challenges. Who is denying that? That is why we have set out on this yatra, to garner as much support as we can."

Tapping the youth

It may not be as sharply playing out on the streets as it did in the 1990s but from Hyderabad University to JNU to FTII, the anger of the students has been tapped by the Congress over the past few months. Vice president Rahul Gandhi has been seen siding with the students against the government.

In fact, just ahead of the Uttar Pradesh elections, the issue of AMU's minority status is gaining traction.

Despite it being a tricky political issue in Uttar Pradesh, the Congress has not shied away when confronted with questions but the matter is being handled delicately.

So as not to upset the electoral social equations it is building up ahead of elections, the Congress through its individual leaders will be seen taking up the matter while itself not dirtying its hands.

For example, Salman Khurshid has indicated that the order of the Allahabad High Court could be challenged, to which Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala replied, "An individual in this country whether he or she belongs to a political party, anybody interested in the welfare of Aligarh Muslim University, including its faculty and teachers, have full right to avail of the constitutional remedies available to them and I don't think either the Congress or BJP will stand or can stand as an obstacle thereto." The winning formula

With a focus on consolidating the upper caste vote and hoping to pull in Muslims, the Congress' strategy is now being played out in the open.

Many believe a big bang campaign started about eight months ahead of the Uttar Pradesh elections is just in time.

Sources say it takes about six-months to hit the peak and then it either begins to plateau or drop.

Not wanting to risk the waning off of new-found support a glimpse of which was seen the day newly appointed UPCC chief Raj Babbar and Sheila Dikshit led a rally from the Lucknow airport to the Congress office in Mall Avenue, the Congress wants to gain momentum, not lose steam.

Twenty-seven years down the line, the Congress has a lot riding on this election.