BATTLEGROUND UP - Part A
In Indian politics, they say that ‘The
road to Delhi goes via Lucknow’. With a population of about 20 crore and an
assembly comprising of a staggering 406 seats, it is no doubt that the impact
of the political drama played out in the state of Uttar Pradesh, are felt at
the Centre. A large number of our national leaders hail from here and the
issues that affect the people in the heart of the ‘Hindi heartland’ regularly
find resonance in the national Parliament.
Apart from being the cradle of Indian
civilization since time immemorial, the state has produced as many as eight
Prime Ministers since independence and is also the home to India’s premiere
political family – The Nehru-Gandhi family. It was the demolition of the Babri
Masjid in the holy town of Ayodhya by Kar-sevaks in
1994 that catapulted the BJP to power, first in UP and then at the Centre. The
80 MPs that represent the state in the Lok Sabha play a crucial role in the
permutations and combinations that take place in the process to form and retain
Union governments or to stack in the numbers to pass contentious bills. After
all, it was the support of the 23 Samajwadi Party MPS that saved the UPA
government after the Communist pulled out their support to the Congress-led
government citing differences over the nuclear deal. And as the state goes to
polls early this year, it is but natural that the assembly polls will be
fiercely contested and can make or break the careers of many a political
heavyweights.
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| UP CM and BSP Chief Mayawati (Courtesty: Article) |
The incumbent Chief Minister and the BSP
supremo, Mayawati will be looking to recreate the magic that brought her to
power in the 2007 assembly polls with a clear majority. Her unique experiment
of fielding a combination of Dalit and Brahmin candidates, a brain-child of her
confidant S C Mishra, dubbed as ‘Social Engineering’, won her the upper caste
votes while BSP’s traditional lower caste support base continued to remain
loyal to her. Though she has managed to complete her full term and improve the
law and order situation in the state, several cases of corruption against her
and her ministers, have continued to haunt her government from time to time.
The forcible acquisition of land from farmers in Bhatta-Parsaul village in
Muzzafarabad district and the agitation that followed, including the death of 4
people in the subsequent police crackdown on the farmer protests, caught
nation-wide attention with opposition parties, including the Congress, BJP etc
aiming to derive political mileage out of the situation. And of course, the
construction of several parks across the state with statues of her, Dr Ambedkar,
her mentor Kanshi Ram and her party symbol, the Elephant out of public
exchequer has been regularly criticized with her political rival, Mulayam Singh
threatening to pull them down if elected to power.
In the 2009 general elections, the ‘Dalit
ki beti’ who is today, India’s richest CM, reiterated her desire to become
the first Dalit Prime Minister of the country.
Although she won 6.7% of the total votes casted and the BSP emerged as the
third largest party in terms of vote share, she managed to win a paltry 21
seats, two less than the SP and one less the Congress in UP. While her dream to
become the PM was dashed, Maya tried to replicate her 2007 strategy in several
other states but with little or no success.
Aiming to retain power for a second
consecutive term, Behenji has tried to improve her public
image by sacking several ‘corrupt’ ministers from her party including her
former close aide, Babu Singh Kushwaha and Avdesh Verma and has denied tickets
to many of her ‘non-performing’ MLAs. Instead of talking about her achievements
as the state’s CM, which in fact, were few and far in between, Maya’s election
campaign is expected to be largely based on the shortcomings of her political
opponents and thus projecting herself as the only viable alternative in
the four sided contest. Besides, she has raised the issue of bifurcation of UP
into four smaller states, thereby putting other political parties into a tight
spot and cut them to size while consolidating her position. Although opinion
polls predict a hung assembly, a victory in the upcoming polls will further
give wings to her national aspirations and make her a top contender for the
leadership of the Third Front in the 2014 general elections, provided its
constituents remain loyal to the cause of forming a non-Congress, non-BJP
government at the Centre.
 |
| SP leader Mulayam Singh Yadav (Courtesy: Samajwadi Party) |
At 72, Mulayam Singh Yadav will enter
the fray to seek a fourth term as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. Training
his guns at the incumbent CM on the issue of widespread corruption in the
Mayawati government, the Samajwadi Party which has christened its poll campaign
as ‘Ummed ki cycle’, promising to ‘undo all damage’ caused by the BSP
government in the last five years. The cycle rallies organized across the
state have attracted sizable crowds but it remains to be seen whether it
translates into votes or not. Amar Singh’s exit has added more credibility to
the party whereas the re-entry of his rival and the party’s Muslim face, Azam
Khan after being expelled for six years in 2009 for anti-party activities, has
boosted the morale of party workers. Realizing that corruption is a major political
issue, all thanks to the Anna Hazare movement, the SP has slammed its doors on
several ministers who were dropped from the Maya cabinet as they were accused
of corruption. However, the lawlessness during his previous tenures and several
impending corruption cases against him and his family members are questions
that have been regularly raised by Mulayam’s detractors and political opponents.
Leading his party’s 'Kranti Rath
Yatra', crown prince and Kannauj MP Akhilesh Yadav has travelled across the
length and breadth of UP in a bid to convince people of vote for his party.
Although the junior Yadav has denied reports that he is the SP’s Chief
Ministerial candidate, a win in the polls will be a shot in the arms and will,
for sure, firmly establish his stature as a mass leader. A victory for the
Samajwadi Party will also bolster Mulayam’s standing on the political stage
ahead of the next national elections. The post poll tie up with the Congress,
like in the past, is likely in case of a hung assembly.
 |
| Congress leaders Digvijay Singh and Rahul Gandhi (Courtesy: Hindu) |
Excluding the Jagdambika Pal government
that was termed ‘unconstitutional’ by the Supreme Court in 1998 after three
days in office, the Congress has effectively remained out of power in Lucknow
in last 22 years. The fortunes of the party have dwindled over the years and
its support base has been largely reduced to areas like Rae Bareily and Amethi
- the Nehru-Gandhi bastions.
However, the 2009 general elections saw a revival of the party as it won an amazing 22 seats to emerge as the second largest party in the terms of the total seats won in Uttar Pradesh. The party leaders gave the credit of this surprising success to Rahul Baba’s campaign and urged him to work towards strengthening the party’s state unit. Over the last few years, he has never missed any opportunity to hit out at the Mayawati government, accusing the 'Elephant' in Lucknow of eating up all the cenral funds allocated to the state by the UPA government. He along with the Congress general secretary and ‘drama-king’, Digvijay Singh led an agitation against the police atrocities in Bhatta-Parsaul. However, the so-called youth icon’s claims that 70 farmers had died in the police crackdown and several of their women were raped, could not be backed with any substantial evidence and like in the past, the senior party leaders had to step in to defend the Gandhi scion.
Though chances of Congress retuning to
power, in spite of a pre poll alliance with Ajit Singh’s RLD, look bleak, the
party will try to muster as many seats as possible and will for sure win more
seats than in 2007, when it was reduced to just 22. A good performance by the
Congress will be a major milestone in Rahul's journey towards the PM's chair
whereas a poor show will give the opposition another reason to belittle the
Congress's Yuvraj. A post
poll tie up with the SP is a realistic possibility and will be a win-win
situation for both the parties. While Mulayam will fulfill his political
aspirations in UP, the entry of the SP into the UPA will boost its strength and
reduce the Congress’s dependence on the mercurial TMC chief Mamata Bannerji.
Also, the tie up will help the Congress-led government to push its own version
of the Lokpal Bill on the upcoming Parliamentary session as it will have the
necessary numbers in both the Houses and prevent further embarrassment from the
Opposition and civil society members over the issue.
 |
| BJP leaders Arun Jaitley and L K Advani (Courtesy: India Today) |
The BJP which grew out of UP to become
the alternative to the Congress has seen the highs and the lows in the state in
the last two decades. In its zenith, the saffron outfit ruled the state on its
own under Kalyan Singh and tied up several times with BSP but this ‘marriage of
political convenience’ has been short lived and has ended up in public fallout
followed by mud-slinging from both sides. The BJP today has no prominent leader
in the state who can mesmerize the crowds like former PM Atal Behari Vajpayee
did during his political career. Murali Manohar Joshi, Lalji Tandon and
Ranjnath Singh lack the charisma and support base to take on the likes of
Mulayam and Mayawati. In the 2007 assembly polls, the BSP ate into the BJP’s
traditional upper caste vote bank, thereby reducing it to just 50 odd seats.
The alleged inflammatory speech by Varun Gandhi boomeranged on the party as the
Muslim votes polarized in favor of the Congress in the 2009 Lok Sabha
elections, and the party finished fourth in spite of an alliance with the Kurmi outfit, Apna Dal.
Hindutva leader Uma Bharati, who was re-inducted into the party after being
dismissed for her on camera spat with Advani has been made in-charge of the UP
poll campaign. The party’s image took a beating when it embraced former BSP
leader, Kushwaha in spite of corruption charges against him. Though the party
has tried some damage control by keeping the former state minister’s primary
membership on hold for the time being, it has lost the moral high ground on the
issue of corruption. As such the BJP’s tirade against Congress over the scams
in the UPA regime and its failure to draft a ‘strong’ Lokpal Bill may find few,
if not no takers. Also, Kushwaha’s entry has drawn criticism from all quarter,
including the state unit, the Sangh
Parivar and NDA allies. Like
the Congress, the BJP too has no realistic chance of coming to power on its own
in UP. Rather it will hope to retain its present number tally or at best, try
to win around 80 to 100 seats and may end up aligning with the BSP.
While the largest state of the world’s
largest democracy goes to polls, the Election Commission of India has an uphill
task to ensure that the exercise is conducted in a free and fair manner and the
code of conducted is adhered to by all candidates. Considering the sheer
massiveness of the state and the hooliganism that has infested it in the past,
the EC has decided to conduct the elections in seven phases starting from 8th February
to 3rd March. Will Mayawati’s ‘Social Engineering’ work for the
second time or will Mulayam ride his way to the legislative assembly on the
SP’s cycle? Will Rahul Gandhi’s charisma translate into votes for the Congress
or will the BJP retain lost ground in the state? These and all other questions
will be answered on 6th March (The States That Matter - Part VII) as the votes are counted and the
results are announced.
More on the Uttar Pradesh Assembly Elections 2012
IMAGES
(1) UP
CM and BSP Chief Mayawati (Courtesy: Article) (Link)
Source: Elephant Giving Nightmares to Rahul
(2) Samajwadi Party leader Mulayum Singh
Yadav
Source: Samajwadi Party
(3) Congress leaders Digvijay Singh
and Rahul Gandhi (Courtesy: Hindu) (Link)
Source: The Hindu - UP polls: Congress for
aggressive campaigning
(4) BJP leaders Arun Jaitely and L
K Advani (Courtesy: India Today) (Link)
Source: India
Today
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