UP polls: Which way will Dalits go this time?
Uttar Pradesh (UP)’s Karhal assembly seat is all over the news these days as Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Akhilesh Yadav is going to contest the election from there. An incident in this constituency from 1974 serves as an indicator of Dalit politics in the state. That year, the Congress ticket was given to a woman who had nothing to do with politics till then. The Congress had not won from there earlier, but the candidate thought that she was in with a chance if she could get the marginalised and women on her side.
During the campaign, she met a Dalit family and found that the head of the family was a good poet in the local language. Impressed with the candidate, the Dalit man offered to attend Congress rallies and public meetings to recite his poetry. Soon his melodious voice and verse began attracting large crowds. Since the poems were largely in praise of the party and candidate, casteist muscle men began to chafe at the bit. So, the Congress lost but managed to save its deposit in the constituency for the first time.
One evening, the candidate found the poet at her doorstep covered in blood. He had brought his frightened wife and small children there in the hope of shelter. The musclemen had beaten him and threatened to kill him. During polling, Dalits could not cast their votes in almost half the polling booths. He was beaten up as a warning to Dalits to not try and vote in the future as well. No one knew then that such incidents would prove a game changer.
Far from this scene, a man named Kanshi Ram was planning, in a systematic manner, to prevent such incidents. After much contemplation, in 1981, he laid the foundation of the Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DS4). Encouraged by the support his organisation received, he founded the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984.
Within just six years, his movement gathered such strength that SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav joined hands with him to take on the Ram mandir issue in Ayodhya. He reached the Lok Sabha after winning from Etawah for the first time in 1991. After that, things moved quickly. Four years later, Kanshi Ram’s chosen heir, Mayawati, was elected chief minister of UP in June 1995. No one could have predicted this seismic social change in the span of just 10 years.
Since then, the Dalit electorate has emerged as a major political force in UP. A total of 86 seats in UP is reserved for Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs). In the 2017 election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won 70 of these seats. The SP, which won an absolute majority in 2012, came up trumps by winning 58 of these seats. When the BSP got a majority in 2007, its victory in 62 of these reserved seats was a major factor in its success. However, these reserved seats are just symbolic, SC and ST voters also influence the election results in general seats. Which way will these voters go this time?
Dalit voters have changed their preferences many times in India’s most populous state. Earlier they threw in their lot with the Congress, later the BSP was their preferred party. After that, the BJP made inroads into this vote bank.
Broadly speaking, the Dalits supported the Congress and the BSP for about three decades each. Now, Dalit mindsets have changed. Young voters do not stick with one particular leader for too long. Will the BJP be able to make a deeper dent in the BSP vote bank this time? The saffron party is hard at work on this. The state government has provided poor Dalits numerous facilities including an increase in free food grain.
It is often said that Dalit and backward voters do not vote together. This is a halftruth. The SP and BSP formed a coalition government in the 1990s. This did not last long as the personal ambitions of the leaders got in the way. Mayawati went a step further in 2007 when she forged a DalitBrahmin alliance. Had she been able to keep this intact, she would not only have risen much further in politics but would also have become the architect of a unique social reform. She was not able to do that and the SP moved into that space.
Mayawati, who has been pretty quiet till now, will begin her formal election campaign from February 2. I recall that in 2007, she was able to, despite considerable odds, turn political equations on their head. Will she be able to do so this time?
There are many such questions that are up in the air as polling day draws near. But, we will only know what impact caste equations, social development and economic growth will have on these crucial polls once the results are out. But these elections are likely to throw up a few surprises.