Khatauli bypoll: Litmus test for Bhim Army’s Azad in a sizeable Dalit constituency

In many ways, Chandrasekhar Azad has the onerous task of reinventing the Dalit political wheel in Uttar Pradesh that Kanshi Ram had undertaken more than a decade to build with Mayawati as the pivot

After becoming a major force in the 1990s Dalit politics in Uttar Pradesh has been increasingly floundering ever since the persistent decline of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati over the past decade. Having squandered her own earlier stunning achievement of making Dalits a game changer in the politics of India’s most populous state, Behenji’s vastly diminished stature brought about by a succession of electoral debacles has caused widespread confusion and lack of self-belief in the community.

A potential alternative, the young and flamboyant Chandrasekhar Azad who had shown early promise through his social movement with his Bhim Army in western Uttar Pradesh badly stumbled during the Assembly polls in the state earlier this year lacking the resources to push his own party or the political skills to ride piggyback on the Samajwadi Party-Rashtriya Lok Dal (SP-RLD) alliance which was the only real challenger to the BJP juggernaut.

It is therefore interesting that the young Dalit leader who had bitterly criticised the SP-RLD alliance after his seat negotiations with it had collapsed on the eve of the Assembly polls has now decided to extend an olive branch to the latter. Azad has been campaigning for the RLD in the Khatauli Assembly by-election and the SP candidate in Rampur both bypolls are being held in the first week next month. The two seats are going for fresh polls because the sitting candidates belonging to the BJP in Khatauli and SP in Rampur have been disqualified after being convicted, the first for his involvement in the Muzaffarnagar communal riots and the second for hate speech.

Significantly, neither the BSP nor the Congress is contesting the by-elections which will be a straightforward bi-polar contest between the BJP and the SP-RLD alliance. Azad’s role could be crucial particularly in Khatauli which has a sizeable Dalit electorate of more than fifty thousand votes. In the assembly elections some months ago the BSP got more than 31,000 votes coming third after the winning BJP candidate and runner up from RLD while the winning margin was barely 16,000 votes. Azad’s own Azad Samaj Party also contested but managed to get barely 800 votes.

Crucial test for Azad

Azad campaigning for the RLD candidate in an electoral contest against the BJP where the BSP is not in the fray could turn out to be a crucial test to prove whether he has the political heft to transfer the traditional BSP Dalit vote to the RLD.

If Azad does succeed and the RLD manages to win Khatauli, it could not only increase his own stature and improve his bargaining position for seats in future elections with the SP-RLD alliance but also open up possibilities for Dalits to renegotiate their place in Uttar Pradesh politics in a post BSP scenario.

On the other hand, a defeat for the RLD despite Azad’s campaign would certainly marginalize him further and deepen the political uncertainty among Dalits in the state.

The Khatauli bypolls will also reveal the inroads that the BJP has been able to make in the Dalit vote in Uttar Pradesh. There is little doubt that for a party that hardly got any Dalit votes beyond the miniscule Valmiki and Khatik sub-castes the BJP has since the 2014 parliamentary polls managed to woo a section of the dominant Jatav vote as well as electoral support from the second largest Dalit group Pasis in the state.

However, after the initial breakthrough in 2014 the progress of the BJP inroad into the Dalit vote in Uttar Pradesh has slowed down despite the steep decline of the BSP and Mayawati’s stature.

Challenge for BJP

The problem facing the BJP in getting a larger chunk of the Dalit vote is that while the older generation still clings on to the BSP hoping for an upturn in Behenji’s electoral fortunes a large number of younger and educated Jatavs although disillusioned with Mayawati are fiercely political many of them Ambedkarite in ideology steadfastly refusing to clamber on to the BJP’s Hindutva bandwagon.

Some of them have tactically switched their vote to the SP-RLD alliance but would ideally like a leader like Azad to negotiate a deal with the main political opponent to the BJP. This is also true for the Pasis who are prone to the young Dalit leader who unlike Mayawati has made a special effort to agitate over atrocities against them by upper castes across the state.

Big question

Yet, a big question mark remains over how successfully Azad will be able to negotiate a political space for the Dalits within the emerging Opposition bid in Uttar Pradesh to credibly challenge the BJP which clearly remains the elephant in the room.

The Bhim Army chief’s first road block is Behenji who despite her faded charisma and growing speculation of an underhand deal with the BJP still holds sway with older and rural Dalit masses. Despite his impressive activist energy, he has shown so far little aptitude for electoral politics which is the main reason why he made an unreasonable demand for too many seats in his negotiations with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav that led to the collapse of a deal on the eve of this year’s assembly polls.

In many ways Azad has the onerous task of reinventing the Dalit political wheel in Uttar Pradesh that Kanshi Ram had undertaken more than a decade to build with Mayawati as the pivot. This would require initial sacrifices in polls in return for a more conducive political scenario to get space for Dalits to grow. Whether this is possible in today’s far faster paced politics remains to be seen.

Courtesy : First post

Note: This news piece was originally published in firstpost.com and used purely for non-profit/non-commercial purposes exclusively for Human Rights .