Jinnah portrait ruckus to demand for Dalit quota in AMU and Jamia: Adityanath has a new strategy
Pitting Muslims against Dalits is the BJP’s best bet to counter a united Opposition in UP.
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath has raised the demand for reservation of seats for Dalits in minority-run institutions, such as Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) and Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI).
Speaking at an event in Chipramau, Kannauj, on June 24, Yogi said, “Ek prashna yeh bhi pucha jana chahiye jo keh rahe hain ki Dalit ka apman ho raha hai… ki akhir Dalit bhaiyon ko Aligarh Muslim University aur Jamia Millia University mein bhi arakshan dene ka labh milna chahiye, is baat ko uthane ka karya kab karenge. (One question should be raised to all those who are saying that Dalits are being humiliated… when would they ask for reservation for our Dalit brothers in Aligarh Muslim University and Jamia Millia Islamia)... if an institution like Banaras Hindu University can give Dalit quota, why can't minority-run institutions like Aligarh Muslim University?"
The UP CM went on to target Congress president Rahul Gandhi, saying he remembers temples only during elections. Adityanath also accused Gandhi and his party of “demoralising the Indian Army”.
Raising the issue of the minority status of AMU and JMI and clubbing it with Dalit reservation seems to be a clever ploy by Adityanath to counter recent political reversals.
The coming together of OBC, Dalits and Muslim votes, with the SP, the BSP and the RLD joining hands, has cost the BJP four by-polls in Uttar Pradesh. While earlier the party lost the prestigious Phulpur and Gorakhpur seats to the SP, the united opposition also won the recently concluded Kairana and Noorpur by-polls.
Creating a rift in the opposition unity, thus, is imperative for the BJP. Any attempt by the opposition parties to rally behind these institutions will also help the saffron party in labelling them “anti-Dalit”.
Minority bashing
While the minority status of AMU has been debated since the Azeez Basha Vs Union of India case, 1967, using them to create a rift between communities, especially in the run-up to elections, is a recent trend.
Even earlier, during the campaign for the May 28 by-polls to Kairana and Noorpur, a controversy erupted when members of Hindu Yuva Vahini-ABVP led a violent protest in AMU over the presence of Mohammad Ali Jinnah's portrait.
Instead of condemning the violence on campus, Adityanath (who incidentally is also the founder of Hindu Yuva Vahini) jumped into the fray, and promised an inquiry over the presence of the portrait. What was glossed over was the fact that the portrait had been in AMU since 1938, as the AMU Students’ Union had conferred the rare honour of a lifetime membership on Jinnah.
The underlying message behind the row was clear — since Jinnah divided the country, he does not deserve to be honoured, and those who do so are anti-nationals.
Instead of addressing the demands of non-payment of dues to sugarcane farmers, the UP CM was more than happy to rake up this 80-year-old issue.
However, having found no takers for the Jinnah controversy, and losing out to the Opposition alliance on both the seats, Adityanath now seems to have come up with another strategy to counter the Opposition.
Antidote to Opposition alliance
The combination of OBC, Dalits and Muslims votes in UP has created a formidable voter bloc that is threatening the BJP’s chances for 2019.
The only way to counter this is a repeat of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, where the BJP got more than 30 per cent votes riding on the Modi wave and the subsequent consolidation of Hindu votes. This combination was so potent that regional parties like the BSP, with a core voter base of Dalits, scored zero.
As a result, the BJP was able to sweep Uttar Pradesh, where the party won 73(71+2 seats of alliance partner) out of 80 seats. This took BJP’s overall individual tally in the Lok Sabha to 282.
Singling out minority institutions and labelling them as those that don’t provide reservation to Dalits serves two purposes for Adityanath.
On one hand, the UP CM would hope to please his right-wing support base that believes that all that the previous governments have done is minority appeasement, with Muslims the biggest beneficiaries of the state's largesse.
On the other, it goes with the BJP strategy of poaching Dalit votes from Mayawati's BSP.
With rising incidents of crime against Dalits already alienating the community from the ruling party, the BJP hopes to use this issue to create a rift in the “secular” Opposition. The game-plan to pit Dalits against the minorities is part of the saffron strategy to counter the coming together of Opposition parties in the name of secularism.
The BJP hopes to counter this “secularism” by labelling it as antagonistic to Hindus. The party would also hope to use this as an antidote to Mandal politics, something that has been the reason for its defeat in states like Bihar, since this secular bloc includes parties like the SP, the BSP and the RJD, with dedicated caste-based voters.
Gameplan 2019
This is not the first time that the UP CM has taken on the “secular” forces. In a speech made on November 14, 2017, Adityanath said, “I believe that the word secular is the biggest lie since Independence. Those that have given birth to this lie and those that use it should apologise to the people and this country. No system can be secular. Political system can be sect-neutral.”
The coming together of the Opposition parties under the umbrella of secularism is the biggest thorn in the BJP’s side. The party believes it will not be able to repeat its 2014 Lok Sabha performance in the wake of this consolidation. The only way out for the party is to go in for an aggressive Dalit outreach. At a recent high-level meeting of the party, it was decided that senior party leaders would visit Dalit homes to counter this growing alienation within the community.
The raking up of the minority status of AMU and JMI is another opportunity for the ruling party to reach out to the Dalit community and undo some of the harm that incidents like Una, Bhima Koregaon and violence by cow vigilantes have done. The last thing that the party needs is for this Opposition alliance to be replicated in other states.
The party also plans to make inroads in states like West Bengal, where it has emerged as the principal opposition party. The BJP has already been peddling the narrative that chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s administration indulges in minority appeasement, something that goes well with its right-wing narrative.
The recent decision of the BJP to end its alliance with PDP in Jammu and Kashmir has also given the party a free hand to go about minority bashing, especially with the Lok Sabha polls less than a year away.
Already, there have been statements from the BJP quarters about how the Mehbooba Mufti government neglected the people of Jammu and Ladakh to pander to her own vote bank. This will also be peddled aggressively in the run-up to the General Elections, to undo the damage that the party feels has been caused by its alliance with a party its supporters view as pro-separatist.
These are not just random statements of a sitting chief minister. There is a method to the madness.
The ruling party knows that if it has any chance to win the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, it will have to divide the opposition parties that have come together to defeat it. And what better way to do that than to indulge in minority bashing, create chinks in opposition unity, add a dash of Pakistan, and claim that the Opposition does not care for the Army.