Realignment: Why UP will not go the Bihar way

LUCKNOW: In October 1995, Bahujan Samaj Party’s founder-president Kanshi Ram told HT: “It will be a big wonder if Mayawati goes with Mulayam Singh Yadav. If I speak to her, woh meri jaan le legi. Donon ek doosre ke khoon ke pyase hai (She will kill me; both are thirsty for each other’s blood).”

From ‘natural allies’ — BSP and Samajwadi Party came together to rule Uttar Pradesh in 1993 — Mayawati and Yadav became bitter foes since June 2, 1995, when SP supporters attacked BSP MLAs at the State Guest House. The SP had reacted to Mayawati withdrawing her ministers from the coalition government the day before.

The enmity, it seemed, was irreparable.

But with resurgent BJP threatening to conquer Lucknow after New Delhi, political quarters are discussing the possibility of a Bihar like political realignment in UP. But can Mayawati and Yadav sink their differences to take on common enemy BJP, as Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad have done in Bihar?

Kumar and Prasad buried the hatchet some time ago, 20 years after ending a political friendship.

“It will require some sacrifice on their (Mayawati and Yadav) part as Kumar did by handing over his chair to a mushahar (the most backward caste). Both will and should come down from their high pedestal for the sake of social justice. Mulayam may still agree, but Mayawati will be uncompromising,” said Badri Narain of the Allahabad-based Dalit Resource Centre.

In her book, Mayawati said she would forgive Yadav if he gave a public apology.

“Unlike Bihar, where both Kumar and Prasad are OBC leaders, Mayawati and Mulayam represent politically and socially conflicting castes — Dalits and Yadavs — that have never voted together except in 1993. The State Guest House incident too is a hot-button issue,” a senior political observer said. Evidently, in these 19 years of their separation, the aspirations of Mayawati and Yadav have risen along with rigidity. Today, Mayawati is leading the demand for the dismissal of the state government.

Together, the SP and BSP polled over 50% votes in the 2009 LS polls and 39% earlier this year. But for them to patch up and be a more potent force, some political analysts feel, the Congress might have to play the mediator’s role.

But the Congress itself has been a divided house on the issue. Yadav’s politics has flourished on the anti-Congress

TOGETHER, THE SP AND BSP POLLED OVER 50% VOTES IN 2009 LS POLLS AND 39% THIS YEAR. BUT FOR THEM TO PATCH UP AND BE A MORE POTENT FORCE, CONGR MAY HAVE TO PLAY MEDIATOR

plank.

In 2009, SP and Congress could not agree on seat-sharing. In the 1995 assembly polls, the BSP browbeat Congress into contesting only 100 of the 425 seats (undivided UP) but befriended BJP to form the government. In the last Lok Sabha polls, Mayawati ignored Congress overtures for an alliance. Congress tied up with the Rashtriya Lok Dal and Mahaan Dal.

After the saffron whitewash in the Lok Sabha polls, a Congress-SP-BSP front is not being ruled out. But the alliance will be possible only if Mayawati and Yadav come together.

In the early 1990s, Kanshi Ram and Yadav had taken all by surprise by entering into a pre-poll alliance to combat the BJP, which was riding the temple wave then. The SP and BSP will have to conjure up another surprise to beat the ‘Modi wave’.