Anil Anand
Predicting election outcome in the religion and caste ridden Hindi hinterland also proverbially called the cow belt has always been a pollster or a political analyst’s predicament. The UP Assembly elections 2017 still nearly a year ahead has already sent political parties and the soothsayers hunting for answers.
It is but natural for the political parties to prepare for this mother of all elections well in advance as it has assumed added significance coming ahead of the next Lok Sabha elections slated in 2019. In the recent past UP Assembly polls were normally a contest between Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samajwadi Party with BJP and Congress making impact here and there. The 2014- Lok Sabha election outcome which immensely contributed to BJP gaining majority on its own has, on paper, changed political calculations in UP.
At a time when the saffron party has already pulled all stops to ensure it repeats the same feat in 2017, it has become imperative for other political parties to gear up with the same verve. It is too early to predict a final line up for the electoral battle, one thing is sure that it is going to be more complicated this time and beyond the Samajwadi Party versus BSP dynamics with BJP becoming an important peg.
There is not much hope for the emergence of a consolidated united front of the non-BJP parties, the hopes of which had momentarily arisen after the success of ‘Mahaghatbandhan” in Bihar elections. But these receded faster even before the idea could truly germinate. Such a front could become a reality only if there is a chance of SP and BSP (read Mulayam Singh and Mayawati) coming together. Post poll compulsions might force the two political dispensations to come together on the plea to check BJP coming to power. But this does not seem to be in the realm of pre-poll tie-ups.
The elections would be a SP versus BSP contest in limited sense of the term as their endeavour would certainly be to check each other in the tracks and emerge on top in the final tally. It could be both the parties vying to cross the half-way mark in the 400 plus House to form the government without any alliance or outside support. And in the worst scenario try and emerge as the single largest party to become a fulcrum for any coalition government formation.
Social engineering based on caste calculations would be common to all political players with the exception of Congress which would have to do more to even improve the seats tally. But all eyes would be on BJP as the party under the tutelage of Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duo is not averse to try new permutations and combinations and enter the territories hitherto alien to BJP or Sangh Parivar.
The moot points are whether BJP will be able to dent the BSP’s strong base of Dalits or will it wean away a section of the strong Yadav base of Samajwadi Party or in the final picture to what extent it rejuvenates its once strong upper caste Hindu vote bank. At this juncture these are mere proposals and possibilities which the BJP leadership, and so are the others, trying to explore.
There are fair indications that the Sangh Parivar would heavily bank on communal polarisation to ensure a BJP victory. The Parivar used a new model to achieve polarisation of votes more on religion than on caste lines in the recently held Assam Assembly elections. The results were fabulous and the strategy helped the BJP make a grand entry into the Eastern most areas of the country.
The strategy in Assam was to ensure polarisation of votes without directly hitting at the minority community. The cover of “illegal immigrants” was aptly used by the BJP strategists to achieve this end.
Will a repeat of this strategy happen in UP as well though with a difference?
There are indications to this effect available in the manner in which BJP leadership reacted either to Mathura’s cult violence or attempts made to give Kairana Hindu migration story a different tilt with a communal flavour. More of it would likely be witnessed in the weeks to come with an equally strong possibility of counter moves by the SP and BSP leaders.
Contrary to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s thrust on development as a core to attract people’s imagination and as a vote garnering device, it is likely to be relegated to the backdrop or would be enveloped by a strong smoke screen of caste and communal agenda. This would be true of other parties as well.
A close scrutiny of developments related to Modi’s grand rally held at Saharanpur to mark two years of his government and subsequently at the party’s Allahabad national executive meeting make it abundantly clear what the party stands for. There are equally strong indications that the Ram Temple agenda might be unfolded once again. These tactics would be used as direct and indirect methods of polarising the voters on particular lines.
The BJP chief recently provided an index of Sangh Parivar’s mind on using the Temple issue in elections. His statement,”we will see who the people of UP will select as their Ram”, reveals more than what it conceals.
The fringe elements or the zealots in the Parivar such as Gorakhpur MP Adityanath or the sundry sadhvis part of Modi’s cabinet have minced no words, on more than one occasion, to insist that ‘Ram Mandi’ will be an important campaign issue. And attempts are still on to ensure that the smouldering embers of Dadri’s alleged beef incident are converted into a full-fledged fire again. The forensic report of a Mathura laboratory that meat found near Mohammed Akhlaq’s Dadri house was beef is being used as a trigger.
At the same time the BJP’s social engineering plan is also focused on attracting non-Yadav, OBCs, MBCs and non-Jatav Dalits to its fold. The first step in this direction is through ensuring representation of these social groups in the party’s hierarchy. Simultaneously, it is organising programmes and events to reach out to members of these castes.
The appointment of Keshav Prasad Maurya, a Dalit, as president of the party’s UP unit, building ties with caste leaders such as Apna Dal’s Anuradha Patel, Anil Rajbhar are all a part of the strategy to create a grand alliance of OBC and MBC castes including Patel, Rajbhar, Maurya, Kaachi, and Nishad.
BJP’s new extended brand of religion and caste engineering, SP attempting to firm up Muslim-Yadav combination, Mayawati trying to cling on to Dalit-Brahmin victory formula with Congress desperately trying to find a middle path. This is the possible pre-poll line up and not the final picture.
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