The backward leaders of Uttar Pradesh BJP, particularly the Dalit faces, have communicated to top guns of the party in Delhi that if it is serious about winning back Dalit votes — which deserted the saffron fold this Lok Sabha election — it must create a Dalit icon who can easily be considered among the top 10.
Many Dalit leaders of the BJP in Uttar Pradesh have also stressed that regardless of BJP’s welfare measures for the backward castes, it won’t help them electorally unless the party exploits the Dalit political iconography which helps them believe “they belong here”, added a source. Another source confirmed to News18 that the message was that BJP needs to groom its own in-house “Mayawati-like figure”.
The message was communicated through a very senior BJP functionary from Delhi. And what was the reaction? “He listened carefully. He did not respond. However, the immediate goal is to win maximum seats in the forthcoming 10 bypolls in the state. Hence, the OBC Morcha and the SC/ST Morchas were asked to be extra active and expand their works and penetrate down to the booth levels,” said a source on condition of anonymity.
With UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath already having declared that the BJP wants to win all 10 seats in the forthcoming by-elections, the BJP’s immediate goal is to ensure a warm response from the Dalit segments to make it happen. After a dismal performance in the Lok Sabha poll, a failure to win a majority of the 10 seats, if not all, will dent both Adityanath and the BJP’s reputation in the state.
However, the source clarified that their suggestion was keeping the long-term outlook in mind, with an eye on the 2027 UP assembly election.
“Even the non-Jatavs have deserted us this time. A tall Dalit figure of BJP from UP alone can now undo their detachments from BJP”, the source added.
According to a post-poll survey conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS)-Lokniti, INDIA bloc snatched away 56 per cent of the non-Jatav Dalit votes — most of whom earlier sided with the BJP. In addition, 25 per cent of Jatav Dalits, too, voted for the SP-Congress alliance.
But why name Mayawati? A BJP source gave the context: “A question was put to us showing statistics how the Narendra Modi government has worked more for the socially disadvantaged and backwards and no one is doubting that. We went to poll with those facts. But the fear psychosis of amendment to reservation with ‘400 paar’ seats caused many Dalits to panic about the future of reservation. That fear is still there. We need to instil a sense of them naturally belonging to the BJP and that can only happen when we have a BJP Dalit face who is as tall as Mayawati. We expressed our heart.”
What has made matters worse for the BJP is an absent BSP — the default Dalit party which has lost its charm, benefitting the SP-Congress. While 44 per cent Jatav Dalits still sided with Mayawati’s party in the Lok Sabha poll this year, only 15 per cent non-Jatav Dalits voted for her party. The BSP — a BJP-friendly opposition party — saw its vote share reduced to single digits for the first time in decades. This time, BSP won just 9 per cent votes which is a sharp fall from 19 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
So, is the BJP leadership listening to their ‘Mann Ki Baat’? While there is no confirmation, recent developments suggest they are. On Tuesday, UP BJP chief Bhupendra Singh met party chief JP Nadda late at night after Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya met the BJP president. Singh is believed to have discussed the action plan and campaigning details for the bypolls.
Meanwhile, the very same day, Union Home Minister Amit Shah went to poll-bound Haryana to address a ‘Picchra Varg Samman Sammelan’ — a job generally kept for BJP’s second-rung leadership. Shah used the event to counter the INDIA bloc’s fear psychosis with a reverse technique where he reminded how INDIA bloc constituents “snatched reservation from backward classes in Karnataka and giving it to Muslims”. He reminded how 27 of 71 Union ministers are from backward classes while how, in 1980, Indira Gandhi shelved the Mandal Commission.
BJP leadership’s immediate task at hand is to win the maximum number of seats out of 10 in the forthcoming bypolls in Uttar Pradesh, thereby proving they are back in the game. But will the BJP groom a Kamlesh Paswan, SP Singh Baghel or Asim Arun to make them the next big Dalit face from UP who can be at par with Mayawati in her prime? Well, we have to wait to see.
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