The districts going to the polls today are Saharanpur, Bijnor, Moradabad, Sambhal, Rampur, Amroha, Badaun, Bareilly and Shahjahanpur.
New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh will go to the second of seven phases of polling today in nine districts. Up for grabs are 55 assembly seats, and voters are set to decide the fates of 586 candidates.
In eight constituencies in districts Bijnor, Sambhal and Saharanpur that have been termed as ‘sensitive’, the UP Police has ramped up security with an extra vigil by central forces and state police. An eye will also be kept on social media at all times, the police said. A constituency with rivalry between political parties, presence of criminals, communal and caste-based tensions is declared ‘sensitive.’
The districts going to the polls today are Saharanpur, Bijnor, Moradabad, Sambhal, Rampur, Amroha, Badaun, Bareilly and Shahjahanpur.
Polling officials collect election materials at a distribution centre on the eve of the second phase of the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, in Moradabad, February 13, 2022. Photo: PTI
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP went on to win with the highest vote share – 37.36%. – that any party has won in decades. Even then, the BJP had only won three seats out of the nine districts, with the remaining six going to the SP-BSP alliance. This suggests that this is a challenging region for the BJP.
With a sizeable Muslim population, these districts are considered to be the strongholds of the Samajwadi Party. Out of the 15 candidates in the previous assembly election, 10 Muslim candidates had emerged victorious.
In the 2017 UP assembly elections, the BJP had won 38 seats out of the 53 seats, while the Samajwadi Party had won 13, and two each by Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Congress.
The SP and the Congress had formed an alliance during this election.
The Congress and BSP, which had fought in alliance with the SP during past two elections (assembly polls and Lok Sabha elections), are contesting on their own.
With a change in dynamics, it will be interesting to see the performance of the BSP and Congress, which have previously won seats in this region in an alliance with the SP.
The SP has aligned with smaller regional parties and representatives from several OBC communities such as Jat, Maurya, Saini, Kushwaha and Rajbhar. Senior Samajwadi Party leader Mohammad Azam Khan, who is fighting the elections from behind the bars, is among the prominent faces in this phase.
He is contesting from his stronghold Rampur seat, while his son Abdullah Azam is debuting his political career from Suar where he is up against Haider Ali Khan, the grandson of former MP Begum Noor Bano. Khan is fighting on an Apna Dal Sonelal ticket, a BJP ally.
Dharam Singh Saini is a prominent face in this phase who emerged out of the wave of shifts of BJP ministers and leaders to the SP after the polls were declared. He will be contesting from Nakud on a SP ticket.
From the BJP, UP Finance Minister Suresh Khanna, incumbent Jal Shakti state minister Baldev Singh Aaulakh are two heavyweights who will be contesting from the Shahjahanpur and Bilaspur constituencies.
BJP’s Mahesh Chandra Gupta, the current State Minister for Urban Development, Overall Urban Development, Urban Employment and Poverty Alleviation is seeking re-election from Badaun.
BJP’s Gulab Devi, the State Minister for Secondary Education in UP, who is contesting from Chandausi has previously been elected four times.
Chhatrapal Gangwar, the current Minister of State for Revenue, is contesting from the Baheri Assembly Constituency on a BJP ticket.
Supriya Aron, former Bareilly mayor will be contesting from Bareilly Cantonment on a SP ticket after leaving the Congress party along with her husband and former Congress MP Pravin Singh Aron.
There has been an aggressive campaign from all parties for this phase, including the hurling of many allegations.
While campaigning for the BJP, Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacked the SP and said that it is important to re-elect the BJP, in order to keep the area “riot-free”. He also said that the SP has fielded even anti-nationals in the election. The PM even referred to the legislation against triple talaq.
While BSP leader Mayawati attacked the SP government for ‘ending’ Jatav-Muslim brotherhood, the Congress continued its campaign on women welfare.
The significance of these parties can be understood by looking their region-wise performance. It is clear that whoever manages the UP polls seat by seat will win the election.
On December 14, the Dharmapur grounds in Jaunpur district of eastern Uttar Pradesh were packed. The occasion was the sixth leg of the Vijay Rath Yatra being led by Akhilesh Yadav.
Waving flags of red, green, yellow and blue, supporters from smaller parties like the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP), the Janwadi Socialist party (JSP), the Mahan Dal and others shouted Samajwadi Party’s new slogan, ‘Pichhdon ka inquilaab hoga, 22 mein badlaav hoga’. ‘The revolution of the backwards is coming, change is in the offing.’
Once it was his turn to speak, Akhilesh took the microphone and said, “Take a look for yourself. How many colours of flags are with us. You will not find so many colours of flags anywhere else. With all these colours, we have made a multi-coloured bouquet. Now, it has become a fight of multi-colour alliances verses the monochromatic mindset of saffron.”
Despite defeats in the 2017 and 2019 elections, when Akhilesh Yadav was in alliance with Congress and Bahujan Samaj Party respectively, he continues to remain upbeat about alliances – but with a twist.
This time, he is creating a formidable coalition by bringing together small caste-based parties from all over Uttar Pradesh. The strategy behind this seems to be that Akhilesh Yadav, since 2014, has been facing charges of being partisan against non-Yadav Other Backward Classes and is keen to shed this image.
The Jaunpur Vijay Rath Yatra. Photo: By arrangement
The Axis My India survey for the 2017 assembly elections shows that 58% OBCs voted for Bharatiya Janata Party, while only 18% voted for SP. But the percentage of Yadavs who voted for SP was 80%.
This is why Akhilesh is trying to ally with smaller parties representing non-Yadav OBCs who constitute 35% of the OBC population in Uttar Pradesh.
Ram Dutt Tripathi, former BBC correspondent, says, “The biggest challenge for Akhilesh to win this election is to break the image of SP being for Yadavs only.”
Agreeing with the idea, Brijesh Shukla, another veteran journalist says, “During the past governments of SP, a number of local leaders were accused of land grabbing, pooling of tenders and hooliganism. This time, he needs to assure voters that this will not be repeated. Yadavs will not be first among equals.”
Some suggest that Akhilesh is using the successful formula perfected by his father Mulayam Singh Yadav by projecting himself as the leader of all backward communities. Preeti Choudhari, a professor of political science at Bhimrao Ambedkar Central University in Lucknow says this formula could pay dividends for Akhilesh.
“Mulayam Singh had a bouquet of leaders of various castes and they would take care of caste equations all over Uttar Pradesh. But later these caste leaders formed their own parties. Now Akhilesh is trying to align with them in hopes of getting the vote of their community,” Choudhari said.
Akhilesh appears to now realise that elections cannot be won only with support from Muslims and Yadavs. To win, SP needs to increase its vote percentage in the state. When SP came to power in 2012 the party got a 29.7% vote share, while in the 2017 assembly elections the BJP got 40% vote share. Muslims and Yadavs, the core voters of SP lead it to a 24-25% vote share. Earlier the SP used to bank on the local candidates to get additional 7-8% of votes but now even that is not sufficient.
Yashwant Deshmukh, the founder-director of the polling agency C Voter says, “Since 2014, the threshold in UP has changed. To win the election a party needs to get 40% vote share. There is a glass ceiling that is 30%, which SP has already reached. Akhilesh is unable to crack that. His idea is that his own base is 25%, and with these smaller parties his base may increase by 15% and he will form the government with 40%.”
However, there are views to the contrary as well which suggest that SP can form a government even with 36-38% vote share.
Shamshad Khan, psephologist and managing director of the PEACS News Service says, “If SP gets 30% vote share, they may stop at 100-120 seats but with these parties coming together their vote share goes up to 34% and they will get 200 seats. And once they are able to reach 36% they can get around 250 seats because then BJP’s vote share of last time will also start coming down.
Family equations
The latest alliance partner of Akhilesh is his estranged uncle Shivpal Yadav who heads the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party. On December 16, this year, after an hour-long meeting with Shivpal at his home, Akhilesh tweeted a photo with him and formally announced the alliance.
प्रसपा के राष्ट्रीय अध्यक्ष जी से मुलाक़ात हुई और गठबंधन की बात तय हुई।
It was the sixth party with which Akhilesh had forged an alliance in a month’s time. Shivpal has significant influence in the Yadav heartland, including the districts of Etawah, Mainpuri, Kannauj and Firozabad.
Alok Joshi, former CNBC Awaaz head and senior journalist says, “ Shivpal has worked closely with Mulayam Singh Yadav for years. His tremendous organisational capabilities will definitely benefit SP.”
The strongest ally
The RLD is the strongest ally of Akhilesh Yadav. It is a regional party of Western UP with a strong vote base in the Jat community. It was founded by Chaudhary Charan Singh, a Jat farmer leader and a former prime minister. His son Ajit Singh, an eight-time MP and the president of the party died during the second wave of COVID-19.
The party is at present led by his son Jayant Chaudhary. The Muzaffarnagar riots of 2013 werea major setback for the party. It sharply divided society and their traditional Jat vote shifted to the BJP.
According to the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies’ studies, in 2014 and 2019 elections, BJP got 77% and 91% of Jat votes respectively, while it had got only 7% of these votes in the 2012 elections. The RLD could only win one seat in the 2017 assembly elections and secured only 1.78% votes in the state.
The party seems to have regained its ground in the region and the farmers’ movement has provided a ground to Jats and Muslims to come together.
Political analysts feel that a major chunk of Jats who shifted to BJP after the Muzaffarnagar riots can be back with the party.
According to estimates by political parties, there are about 14% of Jats in around 20 districts of Western UP. The RLD has a good influence in Baghpat, Meerut, Muzaffarnagar, Moradabad, Saharanpur and Shamli.
Akhilesh is thus banking on Jayant’s popularity in Western UP.
Sharat Pradhan, a senior journalist, says, “After two decades I can see the RLD in its old form as a formidable force in Western UP. RLD’s own vote base will certainly increase in the area.”
SBSP
The SBSP is a caste-based regional outfit representing the Rajbhar community and some other backward castes. It was founded in 2002 by its current president Om Prakash Rajbhar. According to estimates by political analysts, the Rajbhar community is around 4% in UP. They are mainly found in 70-80 seats of eastern UP in which, in 35 constituencies, there are 10,000-40,000 Rajbhar votes.
Om Prakash Rajbhar has influence in districts of Azamgarh, Ballia, Mau, Mirzapur and Ghazipur. The party was in alliance with BJP in the assembly elections of 2017, when it won four seats and got around six lakh votes (0.70%). This time they have formed an alliance with the Samajwadi Party.
Sharat Pradhan says, “The Rajbhar community voted enbloc for BJP in 2017, but may shift this time to the SP alliance not just because of the SBSP, but also with strong Rajbhar leaders from BSP like Ram Achal Rajbhar and Sukhdev Rajbhar joining SP.”
Akhilesh Yadav and Om Prakash Rajbhar. Photo: By arrangement
JSP
JSP was founded and led by Sanjay Chauhan, a backward community leader from Ghazipur.
The party represents mainly the OBC Nonia community of Uttar Pradesh.
According to estimates by political analysts, they are around 2% Nonias in the state. In the 2019 Lok Sabha election the JSP chief fought on SP’s symbol and got around 5 lakh votes. To tackle JSP’s influence, BJP has allied with Prithiviraj Janshakti Party’s Chandan Singh Chauhan, who represents the same community.
Ravikant, assistant professor of Lucknow University says, “Sanjay Chauhan has good influence among Nonia community in Varanasi, Chandauli, Ghazipur and Bhadohi. It will certainly be beneficial for Akhilesh.”
Mahan Dal
Mahan Dal is a caste-based regional party representing Maurya, Kushwaha and Shakya OBC communities. It is led by Keshav Dev Maurya and was founded in 2008.
According to estimates by political analysts, these communities are around 6%. Keshav Dev Maurya enjoys the support of backward castes in districts like Kasganj, Farrukhabad, Etah, Badaun and Fatehpur.
Hisam Siddique, a senior journalist, says, “In the last few elections a major chunk of these communities had supported BJP. But their alliance will help the SP. Keshav Dev Maurya has already taken out a Yatra in around a dozen districts to mobilise his community.”
Originally, Apna Dal, a caste-based party representing the Kurmi OBC community mainly in eastern UP, was founded by Sonelal Patel, a Kurmi leader who was earlier in BSP.
After his death, a family feud led to his party diving into two factions. Sone Lal’s daughter Anupriya Patel who is at present a minister in the Union Cabinet leads the Apna Dal (S) and her mother Krishna Patel is the president of Apna Dal (Kamerawadi) supported by Anupriya’s younger sister, Pallavi Patel.
According to political analysts, there are 5% Kurmi voters in UP and around 12% in Eastern UP. Kurmis hold sway over districts like Varanasi, Mirzapur, Bareilly and Ambedkar Nagar. The Kurmi community fully backed BJP in the last few elections in UP.
This time SP is trying to make inroads in the community by bringing Krishna Patel and Lalji Verma, a strong Kurmi leader and an erstwhile BSP MLA to its fold.
Brijesh Shukla says, “Krishna Patel does not have much influence on Kurmi votes, like her daughter Anupriya Patel. But Lalji Verma will prove to be more of a vote catcher for the party.”
Small but significant
Although these parties do not have state-wide influence, their significance can be understood by looking their region wise performance. Experts suggest these parties separately do not create much impact but when they work in alliances, they can be a formidable force.
Shamshad Khan says, “If Sanjay Chauhan has an impact in 12 seats, Krishna Patel in 5 seats, Om Prakash Rajbhar in 10 seats, then this will be the BJP’s loss and the SP’s gain. On every seat, an average 3,75,000 people vote. If a party is able to shift 25,000 votes on a particular seat, it’s a big deal. Whoever manages this election seat by seat, will win the election.”
With its rallies drawing lacklustre crowds, there are signs that BJP could fall back on its time-tested method of raking up communal fervour to polarise voters to its advantage.
New Delhi: Anticipated losses in the upcoming assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh because of growing discontent among farming communities are believed to have triggered Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to rescind the contested farm laws.
The crucial question, however, is whether it came too late in the day. The electoral momentum will soon reach its peak in the state as parties have already started campaigning extensively. In this scenario, Modi’s decision to revoke the laws will naturally be seen as an electoral choice instead of a reflection of any real empathy for farmers’ problems.
Successive developments in India’s most-populous state throws light on why Modi was forced to take the decision, despite the fact that his government had mostly been reticent in heeding farmers’ unions over the last year.
The most significant of these developments are how the opposition parties, especially Samajwadi Party and Congress, have pivoted the election campaign towards fundamental issues like unemployment, price rise, and women’s safety, along with chief minister Adityanath’s alleged authoritarian decisions to clamp down on any form of dissent. Most recently, the ruling BJP has struggled to gather crowds for even the prime minister’s airport inauguration at Kushinagar and the Purvanchal Express highway inauguration at Sultanpur. The opposition raised a hue and cry over the use of the state’s transport corporation buses to bring in people from various districts for the event.
At the same time, state media highlighted the phenomenal response the SP president and former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav’s rallies received in the ‘Samajwadi Vijay Yatra’ rallies. Thus, the largely spontaneous crowd at his rallies was pitched against BJP’s forced mobilisation of people at the PM’s rallies.
In terms of electoral optics, this was not something the BJP could have enjoyed.
Gorakhpur-based senior journalist Manoj Kumar Singh says, “The success of the opposition parties in dominating the political narrative on livelihood issues ahead of the elections has been bothering the BJP, which has been trying to offset anti-incumbency sentiment in the state. The poor turnouts in the PM and CM’s rallies appears to be a flashpoint behind the decision to repeal the farm laws.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi being greeted at Amausi Airport while returning to New Delhi, in Lucknow. UP CM Yogi Adityanath and Home Minister Amit Shah are also seen. Photo: PTI
Ready planks for opposition
In the 2014 parliamentary polls and the 2017 assembly polls, the saffron party could drive the political narrative in the state, while the opposition parties struggled. BJP’s campaign was a mix of development-oriented rhetoric with heavy doses of Hindutva. Its political pitch successfully polarised the electorate on religious lines, while also alienating the Yadavs against other OBC groups and the Jatavs, against other Dalit groups. The consolidation of the numerically heavy non-Yadav, non-Jatav, and ‘upper’ caste groups in favour of BJP helped it amass a massive majority.
Not only did they highlight the apparent authoritarian measures of the chief minister, but also pointed out the state’s failing public infrastructure.
Then, Adityanath government’s poor management of the coronavirus pandemic and its subsequent failure to contain deaths induced by the dengue outbreak became talking points, with opposition parties pointing at the state’s healthcare vaccuum. All the while, opposition parties aired concerns over employment, pension, price rise, shortage of fertilisers, low sugarcane prices – all of which affect various caste groups in one way or another.
A range of such factors helped the opposition parties present an inclusive development agenda that looked different from the BJP’s in both tone and tenor.
Pitched campaigns versus old narratives
The Samajwadi Party, meanwhile, also attempted to shed its Yadav-centric perception by initiating ties with smaller parties like the Jayant Chaudhary-led Rashtriya Lok Dal, Om Prakash Rajbhar’s Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party, the Mahan Dal led by Keshav Dev Maurya, and Sanjay Chauhan’s Janwadi Party (Socialist) – all of whom have some degree of influence in the state and are centred around single-caste groups. Akhilesh Yadav has also managed to poach influential leaders from the Bahujan Samaj Party, like Lalji Verma, Ramachal Rajbhar, Ram Prasad Choudhary and others, and some others from the Congress.
SP’s outreach to non-Yadav and non-Jatav leaders in UP against a larger campaign on livelihood issues has not only helped it broaden its social base but also position itself as the primary challenger to BJP.
Various surveys have been pointing out that the upcoming elections may inch closer towards a bi-polar contest between BJP and SP. In such circumstances, the BJP with the numerically-strongest electoral base until now, has enough reasons to worry. The party had benefited immensely from a four-cornered contest that resulted in a division of opposition votes. Any consolidation of opposition votes in favour of SP will make its electoral prospects grimmer.
Moreover, even as the SP’s political umbrella is expanding, the high-pitched Congress campaign may also dent the BJP’s traditional support among the upper castes and a few Dalit groups. Any increase of the Congress’s vote share will directly be at the cost of the BJP, political observers in Uttar Pradesh believe.
Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav. Photo: Twitter/yadavakhilesh
Over the last few months, the BJP has been trying hard to offset the emerging bi-polar electoral equations but has largely failed. The party has showcased new road infrastructure, opening of medical colleges, and a general improvement in law and order situation under Adityanath’s rule. More recently, it has focused on the free ration scheme and cash transfer to the poor introduced jointly by the Union and state government. At the same time, its rank and file has attempted to create a fear of Muslim- and Yadavs-led aggression in case BJP is ousted from power.
However, none of these appears to have stuck with people like the BJP would have wished for. Amidst rising voices from the opposition, BJP’s campaign has had only a lacklustre appeal. So much so that its tried and tested plan of communal polarisation has also not worked according to expectations.
Akhilesh as target
In recent times, many BJP leaders, including the chief minister, have attempted to paint Akhilesh as a leader steeped in the politics of alleged ‘minority appeasement’. Adityanath’s remark that Akhilesh’s (rather gentle) comment on Jinnah also reflected his “Talibani mindset” was a part of BJP’s design.
Similarly, UP BJP chief Swatantra Dev Singh tweeted a video clip of Akhilesh’s interview and said: “The love for Jinnah is intact. @yadavakhilesh ji you want to read history books of India or Pakistan?” UP’s minister of state for parliamentary affairs Swaroop Shukla went on to brand Akhilesh as a Pakistani spy agency ISI’s agent.
Such an acrimonious campaign against Akhilesh, surprisingly, was over the SP leader’s matter-of-fact comment that leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel and Muhammad Ali Jinnah went to the same college in the UK and had played a role in India’s freedom struggle.
Despite its desperate efforts to deflect the election campaign towards a more communally-charged environment, the saffron party until now has been largely unsuccessful in driving the political narrative this way.
Its formidable bastion western Uttar Pradesh, where it has been reaping the benefits of Jat-Muslim polarisation, has fallen. The farmers’ movement has brought the two communities together to a large extent, because of which BJP faces a tough challenge in at least 40 of the 100 seats in the region where the two communities outnumber others. The signs of coming together of Jats and Muslims forced the BJP to work out an alternative polarisation tactic that is to pitch the dominant Gujjars, perceived as loyal to the BJP, and other smaller groups against Jats.
Local Jats and Muslims came together at the kisan mahapanchayat in Muzaffarnagar in September. Photo: Ismat Ara
The Adityanath problem
However, Adityanath’s political faux pas also undid the tactic before it properly took shape. In September, Adityanath unveiled a statue of ninth-century king of the Gurjar-Pratihara dynasty Mihir Bhoj in western UP’s Dadri. However, Gujjars soon started agitating against it as the caste title of the monarch was missing in the statue. This absence was seen by Gujjars as an affront to the community. The leaders of the community in a Mahapanchayat spoke about the episode as a deliberate attempt by the chief minister to appropriate their cultural heritage and appropriate Raja Mihir Bhoj as a Rajput, the caste group to which Adityanath belongs.
Similarly, the BJP also attempted to pitch Sikhs against Hindus in the aftermath of Lakhimpur Kheri’s ghastly incident. All protesting farmers who were crushed by the convoy of cars allegedly led by the BJP’s union home minister Ajay Mishra’s son were Sikhs. Dreading electoral losses in the Terai region and parts of Awadh, the BJP tried to consolidate Hindus against Sikhs but the farmers’ leaders soon defused tensions in the area and the polarisation failed to fructify. In eastern UP regions, Adityanath hasn’t found much support from the BJP leaders, observers believe. The influential Brahmin community see the chief minister as a Rajput despot more than a BJP leader.
“The notion that Modi and Yogi are in opposite camps, and do not like each other has taken deep roots in most parts of the state. Some even speculate that Modi would benefit without Yogi in power in the 2024 parliamentary polls. Such a perception among BJP rank and file and also among commoners do not bode well for the saffron party,” a political analyst in western UP, who requested anonymity, told The Wire.
A BJP mid-level leader told The Wire that the party is currently confident about its electoral prospects only in Bundelkhand and parts of central UP, while in other parts its strategies haven’t worked according to its will.
A last ditch attempt
Against such a political backdrop, Modi’s decision to repeal the farm laws appears to be more like a last ditch effort to contain its downward spiral in the state. The electoral battle in UP is a prestige battle for the BJP.
With the sudden announcement to roll back the farm laws, BJP has attempted to shift the focus away from Adityanath towards Modi, who has proven to be the single-biggest attraction among voters in the last few elections.
The spotlight on Modi, the BJP expects, will help it salvage most of its predicted losses.
The recent photographs released by BJP in which Modi is seen advising Adityanath as both of them walk through the same corridor, project a united family, and on the other register Modi’s supremacy in the party unambiguously.
The U-turn on the farm laws also appear to be part of BJP’s desperate attempt to hijack the political narrative from the opposition parties, and anchor it away from livelihood issues and towards communal polarisation. UP-based observers believe that Modi’s decision may help the BJP counter opposition moves, and pacify the non-dominant caste groups which appeared hesitant about their support to the saffron party.
However, they also foresee a spike in communal clashes in the days to come.
“Had Modi announced a roll back six months ago, the party could have benefitted electorally. But now it is being perceived purely as an electoral decision. It may help the BJP contain the anger of some communities but only marginally,” says Lucknow-based senior journalist and political analyst Sharat Pradhan.
However, with this last-minute attempt to placate the electorate, the BJP will depend heavily on religious polarisation. It has no other plank left in its basket. “The state is most likely to witness an escalation of communal incidents and an increase in anti-Muslim campaigns, in the days to come,” he adds.
The farmers’ protests kickstarted the much awaited process of healing between communities. It is now up to the opposition political parties to take a cue.
New Delhi: In what may be a political game changer in western Uttar Pradesh, the Samajwadi Party has formally declared its tie-up with the Rashtriya Lok Dal for the assembly polls due early next year.
The alliance between the two forces would likely translate to the social coalition of dominant peasant community Jats and a sizeable population of Muslims. A series of farmer mahapanchayats over the last few months had seen both the communities coming together on a common platform for the first time since the 2013 Muzaffarnagar communal riots.
“Our alliance with RLD is final. Seat sharing is to be finalised,” SP president and former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav told the news agency PTI in an interview, while also declaring that he will not be contesting the assembly polls. Yadav, an MP from Azamgarh, had not contested the 2012 assembly polls, in which his party won, either. He then went on to serve as the chief minister for the next five years as a member of the legislative council.
However, hours after Yadav’s announcement, a chance meeting between Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi and RLD leader Jayant Chaudhary at the Lucknow airport sparked off rumours that the latter may also be open to an alliance with the grand old party if it is handed a poor deal by the SP. Speaking to reporters, Chaudhary tactically didn’t declare an alliance with the SP but said that the talks between both parties had been “positive”.
Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi with RLD chief Chaudhary Jayant Singh at Lucknow airport. Also in the photo are Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel and Congress MP Deependra Hooda. Photo: Twitter/@JavedRashid_INC
Nonetheless, it appears clear that RLD’s first preference is likely to be SP, which has a substantial vote bank in the state.
SP has already decided against partnering with the Congress, with which it had forged a pre-election alliance for the 2017 assembly polls. The grand old party has been attempting to emerge as an alternative front with aggressive campaigning and a new agenda but a lack of cadre base could admittedly limit its electoral prospects.
Against such a backdrop, the RLD-SP may surge ahead of other opposition groups like the Congress and the Bahujan Samaj Party in positioning itself as the primary challenger to the Adityanath-led Bharatiya Janata Party. In terms of social coalition, the coming together of RLD, which has an emotional connect with the dominant Jats (who comprise around 14% of the population), and SP that enjoys the patronage of Yadavs and Muslims, would substantially improve the front’s electoral prospects.
In 2013, communal riots had torn asunder the social fabric of the region and ruptured the historical alliance between the two communities that the former Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh had tactically groomed on the basis of common agrarian concerns.
However, following the riots, Jats and other agrarian communities among the Hindus had veered towards the then fledgling BJP, which grew powerful on the basis of polarising the region on religious lines. Riding on majority support, the saffron party emerged as the most dominant political force in the region, sweeping the sugarcane belt in election after election since 2013.
So strong was the saffron tide that western Uttar Pradesh’s tallest leaders, including RLD founder Ajit Singh and his son Jayant Chaudhary lost to BJP in both the 2014 and 2019’s Lok Sabha elections. In the last assembly polls, the BJP won 78 of the 100-odd seats of western UP spread across 20 districts, while the SP – the second largest party – could win only 16.
The agitations against the farm laws and concerns over livelihood have now brought the communities together once again, giving a fillip to opposition political parties which have been looking for a window to bridge religious divisions and foreground livelihood issues as electoral concerns.
The formalisation of the RLD-SP alliance would not only put the opposition in a formidable position in around 40 seats of the region but may also likely channel the political rhetoric towards often-ignored farm issues.
Much of the credit for such a social coalition will go to the farmers’ protests, which had highlighted the agrarian crisis in the region as one which goes beyond caste, creed, and community lines.
It was a historic moment when Rakesh Tikait, the biggest farmer leader in western UP, raised the slogan of “Har Har Mahadev” and “Allahu Akbar” from the dais of the Muzaffarnagar mahapanchayat on September 5, 2021, reminding the participants of his father and one of the tallest farmer leaders of the country, Mahendra Tikait’s communally harmonious outlook.
Both Mahendra Tikait and Charan Singh had organised various communities of the region around agricultural issues. But following the riots, both Rakesh and Naresh Tikait had swung towards BJP, and were accused of having given provocative speeches against Muslims. Rakesh Tikait-led agitations against the BJP regime over the last year is thus being seen as a homecoming, and has further cemented his position as a farm leader instead of a representative of a particular community.
Farmer leader Rakesh Tikait. Photo: PTI
The RLD-SP alliance, therefore, would force BJP to change its political play.
Losing Jat votes may cost BJP dearly in the region. To counter its influence, BJP has already been working on uniting smaller and scattered communities which together make up a sizeable population. In Haryana, the saffron party was successful in uniting around 33 caste groups against the dominant Jats but had ditched the strategy in western UP as Jats were politically aligned with it.
The BJP’s play would be to emulate the Haryana strategy in western UP in the run-up to the assembly polls, during which it would primarily attempt to to bring together communities other than Jats, Muslims, and Yadavs in its fold. Gujjars, Sainis, Kashyaps, non-Jatav Dalits, Nai, Kurmis, Banias et al are some of the caste groups which have been under the influence of Hindutva.
BJP’s attempt would be to engineer a reverse polarisation against Jat-Muslim unity in the region.
Both the SP and RLD, therefore, have been organising regular outreach programmes to prevent such a caste-based polarisation. Over the last few months, especially the SP has held events to reach out to these smaller communities and have attempted to break away from its perception as a Muslim-Yadav party. Akhilesh Yadav’s alliances with Om Prakash Rajbhar’s Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party in eastern UP, Kurmi-dominated Mahan Dal founded by Keshav Dev Maurya, which is influential in central UP, and now with RLD are directed at altering his party’s perception among non-Yadav OBCs and non-Jatav Dalits, a substantial section of whom have supported BJP in the last few elections.
“BJP has relied on Hindutva and support of Jats and other smaller communities in western UP. The farmers’ protests have largely neutralised the Hindutva influence in the area. What we are trying to do now is to prevent a reverse caste-based polarisation that would keep the BJP in play,” said an SP district president from the region, who requested not to be named.
He added that the party’s focus therefore would be to highlight chief minister Adityanath’s highhandedness and apathy towards farm issues that has the potential to unite all peasant communities against BJP, and defuse the saffron party’s expected political narrative that would pitch the dominant castes against the non-dominant ones.
The RLD-SP alliance in the current context would go a long way in shifting not merely electoral dynamics but also the social equations of western UP. The farmers’ protests kickstarted the much awaited process of healing between communities. It is now up to the opposition political parties to take a cue and cement the developing harmony without fear.
