Whether BJP sweeps Uttar Pradesh elections will be decided now
No one is sure which way the wind is blowing in the ongoing Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. While the electorate seem confused and silent, the election appears "issueless".
Uncertainty has gripped the main parties contesting the elections — now busy making course corrections and returning to tried and tested formula — making it a seat-specific battle. Thus, the overall analysis will be based on anecdotal evidence, hearsay and a general assessment of caste distribution per seat.
Reports on the ground suggest that all three players — the BJP, the SP-Congress combine, and the BSP — have been able to hold onto their core base. There are also reports of possible losses in all the camps — the SP-Congress losing Muslim vote base to BSP in the third round, the BJP losing its traditional Baniya vote and the BSP perturbed by inroads made by the BJP into its non-Jatav support base.
So it appears that the real winner would be the one which can make its core voter base stick to the party.
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| Uncertainty has gripped the main parties contesting the elections. (Credit: PTI file photo) |
In the run-up to the polls, indications are clear that the BJP has been able to get its social engineering math better than others, but to what extent is difficult to predict. Adding a dash of Hindutva and social engineering, the BJP is eyeing to consolidate its upper caste vote base and capture a chunk of non-Yadav and backward OBC votes.
A rainbow coalition of castes
The party's social engineering is evident in the way the BJP has organised its campaigning team led by Narendra Modi (OBC), Rajnath Singh (Thakur), Keshav Prasad (non-Yadav OBC), Uma Bharti (Lodh), Kalraj Mishra (Brahmin), Yogi Adityanath (Hindutva face), and Amit Shah at the forefront. By making Keshav Prasad Maurya, its state president, the BJP has sent strong signals to non-Yadav OBCs (forming 32 per cent voter base) who are already charmed by Modi’s caste credentials.
The coming phases will see this social engineering gaining more prominence as elections would enter the zone of caste-centric leaders such as Anuradha Patel and Anil Rajbhar, who can ensure a grand alliance of OBCs and MBCs, including Patel, Rajbhar, Maurya, Kaachi, and Nishad.
Uma Bharti has been stationed at Bundelkhand area to win over the numerically influential Lodhs and Nishads.
OBCisation of Hindutva
The BJP had probably started working on its social engineering math much before its rivals. With Modi, Shah and Maurya at the forefront, the BJP, traditionally considered a party of Brahmins and Baniyas, got its OBC "colours".
The Sangh Parivar also ran “Vichar Kumbh” and “Bhaichara Sammelans” to facilitate bonding among the Dalits, OBCs and savarnas. The Samajik Samrasta Bhoj at the “Vichar Kumbhs” is an attempt to strengthen the party’s ties with non-Jatav Dalit castes. Earlier in 2016, the BJP organised the “Dhamma Chetna Yatra” with Buddhist monks to win over Dalit votes.
The Sangh specifically sees these religious ceremonies as a means to expand its Hindutva political sphere.
The BJP has also held religious fairs and built temples for local heroes and gods revered by these castes — temples of Suheldev Rajbhar Rajbhar hamlets. It has also brought in members of social groups belonging to these castes into its fold and given them strong mandal posts.
Many smaller groups such as the Samta Dal (of Nishads) and the Prajapati Vaicharik Samuh have reportedly tilted towards the BJP. With the political hierarchy in the SP and the BSP well-defined and more reserved for their core groups, social leaders belonging to numerically less castes see the BJP as their political ally.
The BJP has also reserved ranks for leaders from backward classes such as Khatik, Sonkar, Musahar, Bhangi, Keori, Rajbhars at its mandal level.
Tickets to turncoats
It's too early to comment if fielding turncoats (something that has upset many party cadres) will bring social dividends. By bringing in mass leaders such as Swami Prasad Maurya and RK Chaudhary, the BJP has signalled a paradigm shift from its Brahmin-Baniya strategy. The party has estimated to have got almost 60 per cent of MBC votes in 2014, a growth of nearly 100 per cent compared to previous elections.
It looks almost impossible to repeat that performance, in absence of any pro-BJP wave, but the party is leaving no stone unturned to keep the MBCs consolidated behind it. The BJP has given 167 seats to OBC and MBC candidates in an attempt to court these politically less represented classes. By including in its list some heavyweight turncoats, the BJP is only looking to take the party’s profile in this social category several notches high.
The silent Brahmin
With the BJP relying on its social engineering formula and actively courting MBCs, the Brahmins — BJP's core vote bank — are finding themselves sidelined. Any attempt at wooing MBCs is seen as a political excuse to sideline the dominant caste groups.
The BJP did it successfully with the Jats in Haryana, the Marathas in Maharashtra and possibly Patidars in Gujarat. On paper, the "OBCisation" of the party (based on the assumption that upper castes are likely to remain loyal to it) looks like a risky strategy, especially when the BSP has given 67 seats to Brahmins and the Congress (which had earlier announced a Brahmin CM candidate) putting forward its Brahmin heavyweights in the state to actively participate in the campaigning.
Going by history (equation of Brahmins with the Congress), it is conceivable that a section of the Brahmin vote might go to the SP-Congress alliance.
The social engineering formula will be best tested in the fourth phase and onwards, as elections move to Bundelkhand, which has been the battleground of the forward and backward class clash. It was in Bundelkhand that BSP founder Kanshi Ram in the 1990s successfully used his “pachasi versus pandrah” formula and consolidated the “85 per cent” — Dalits, backward castes, Muslims — against the “15 per cent” comprising upper castes.
But if the social coalitions work in the BJP's favour, it will mean a dramatic shift in the party’s strategy and expansion of social base. The recent attempts by the prime minister to portray himself as a "leader of the poor" and turning the demonetisation issue into a "rich versus poor" battle, is all part of this script.
If everything falls in place for the BJP, Uttar Pradesh 2017 might see a repeat of 2007 when one party — BSP — swept the state. The only difference will be that this time it would be the BJP.