At Dhaulana meet, Rajputs take vow not to vote for BJP
Kshatriya discontent against the ruling party found a voice on Wednesday in western Uttar Pradesh when hundreds from the community from Ghaziabad, Hapur, Meerut, Bulandshahr and Gautam Budh Nagar participated in a “Kshatirya Swabhiman Mahasammelan” in Dhaulana in Hapur district.
The Dhaulana area is part of Satha-chaurasi belt which has 60 villages belonging to Shishodia Rajputs while 84 belong to Tomar Rajputs and these villages fall under parliamentary constituencies of Ghaziabad, Meerut and Gautam Budh Nagar.
After Muslims and Dalits, Rajputs are the single largest community in western UP, especially concentrated in Ghaziabad, Saharanpur, Meerut, Kairana, Gautam Budh Nagar, Muzaffarnagar, Baghpat and Aligarh, among others, experts said.
Thousands from the Rajput community in western Uttar Pradesh took part in the meeting on Wednesday and vowed to not give votes to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2024 Lok Sabha.
“There was a gathering of about 4,000-4,500 people, majorly from Rajput community. The meet in Dhaulana is part of a series of panchayats being held since April 7 in Manota, Sisoli, Kheda-sardhana, among others. One more will be held at Ghodi-bacheda on April 20 in Gautam Budh Nagar. This is a movement by the Rajput community,” said Lalit Rana, chairperson, Rashtrawadi Pratap Sena and convener of the programme at Dhaulana.
“There have been controversies wherein our revered Samrat Mihir Bhoj was termed a Gujjar. Then, some BJP leaders termed only the people from Jat community as farmers, while degrading others. Further, Kshatriya candidates were denied tickets in western UP. This also include the ticket denied to Gen VK Singh (retired) in Ghaziabad. The BJP denied representation to our community in nine seats in western UP. All these issues have not gone down well with our community members. We have now decided that we will boycott the BJP and will support party/candidate who is giving a fight to BJP,” Rana said.
On Thursday, chief minister Yogi Adityanath is scheduled to hold an election rally in nearby Pilkhuwa.
“The BJP is now sending Adityanath to different areas of western UP for damage control. He is welcome but this will not have any impact. People here are traditionally attached to the BJP and we will now spread our message among the masses about our issues,” said Bhram Singh Rana, state general secretary (UP), Kisan Mazdoor Sangathan.
The BJP office bearers said the ticket distribution was decided by the party.
“Many of our leaders, including the defence minister, are Thakurs. Those opposing the BJP are a handful and it seems that they are playing into the hands of the opposition. We are confident that people in Dhaulana and other parts of western UP will go with the BJP,” said Ajay Sharma, Lok Sabha converner (BJP – Ghaziabad).
The Dhaulana segment topped the polling percentages among the five segments of Ghaziabad parliamentary constituency in 2019. Its voting percentage stood at 65.67 in 2019 Lok Sabha elections.