Why BSP should shift from sarvajan’ to ‘bahujan’
The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), traditionally identified as a party with large-scale support from Dalits, OBCs and minorities that constitute ‘Bahujan’ in political discourse, was known for its radical stand against caste-based social discrimination and atrocities on bahujans.
BSP labelled the upper caste groups and other mainstream political parties as ‘manuwadi’.
However, since 2005-07 it changed its position and started wooing upper caste groups for political support.
The party attracted a large upper caste support, particularly Brahmins, during the 2007 assembly election in Uttar Pradesh with a popular appeal for ‘sarvajan hitay, sarwajan sukhay’.
The slogan was a clear indication that the BSP was no longer associated only with Dalit vote base, rather it expanded its ideological inclination from ‘bahujan to sarvajan’.
Importantly, Mayawati strongly conveyed the message during her campaigns, party meetings, and in media conferences, that the Bahujan Samaj Party is the party for ‘sarvajan’ and it promises to work for all people, irrespective of caste and religious identity.
However, continuous defeats of the BSP in electoral politics and shrinking support of upper caste entails that the party must shift its political position from ‘sarvajan to bahujan’.
FROM ZENITH TO NADIR
Though the Bahujan Samaj Party won the assembly election in 2007, it lost badly in the 2012 assembly polls, followed by the 2014 parliamentary election.
The party experienced from being an absolute majority party in 2007 UP assembly election to getting zero seats in the national election of 2014, which was quite shocking and surprising for many because BSP holds a distinct social base in UP.
In the 2017 UP elections, the BSP emerged as the secondlargest political party in terms of vote share with 22.23% of total vote share but could win only 19 legislative seats, which was surprising for many.
Since 2007, the vote share dropped up to more than 5% and the number of legislative seats dropped from 206 to 80 in 2012 and subsequently in 2017 assembly election dropped from 80 to 19 seats.
Apart from UP, the BSP also has significant support in Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Punjab but gradually it is losing ground in these states as well.
WAY FORWARD FOR BSP
The BSP had made an appeal at various party forums to give reservation to the upper caste poor.
The party’s stand in favour of reservation for upper caste poor is against the fundamental base of reservation policy and it is causing anger and dissatisfaction among Dalits.
The party’s cold response on Una caste atrocities, Saharanpur atrocities with Dalits, Bhim Koregaon issues and remark of Mayawati about Bhim Army’s Chandrashekhar Azad Ravan’s affiliation with RSS are additional factors, which are causing anger and dissatisfaction among Dalits and minorities.
‘Bahujan-SCs, STs, OBCs, and minorities’ share approximately over 80% of India’s total population and the BSP was significantly representing them in the political discourse, then what was the need for the party to appease Brahmins and upper castes?
It has been a trend that upper caste support has never been associated with a single party; traditionally it was with the Congress but shifted to the BJP with the emergence of Hindutva politics during the 1990s.
And when the BJP was on the decline in UP, shifted to the BSP during 2007 assembly election and again came back to BJP since 2014.
Therefore, instead of focusing on upper caste support, the Bahujan Samaj Party should focus on its traditional support base – Dalits, OBCs, and minorities or the ‘Bahujan’, because it shares the largest population and the foundation of BSP lies in ‘Bahujan’ only.