There is little doubt that the final outcome of the 2019 general election will be determined in great part by the vote in Uttar Pradesh . The battleground State is home to 80 of 543 Lok Sabha constituencies, enough to make or break governments. The jury is still out on the final outcome. What is clear is that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is having a hard time replicating its 2014 performance in U.P. in 2019. Anti-incumbency caused by a combination of economic factors and the Opposition on the ground propelled by the mahagathbandhan — alliance of the Samajwadi Party (SP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) — has created an unexpected new political dynamic. This alliance has been formed with an explicit anti-BJP focus and is likely to have a significant impact on the outcome of the 2019 election.
Two issues will determine the result in the State. These are: Hindu voter consolidation and caste mobilisation. These issues can also serve as a lens to track the shifts in the State’s politics more broadly.
Shaky narrative
The BJP’s stunning victory in the 2014 Lok Sabha election relied heavily on U.P. Till a couple of months ago, the BJP had the political momentum in its favour but in the dying phases of the long campaign it was struggling to regain momentum. In 2014, the BJP was an outsider; in 2019, it is the incumbent at both the State and national levels, making an anti-establishment campaign untenable. Economic issues have played an important role in shifting the ground. The BJP doesn’t have a great story to tell the voters of U.P.; hence, it has focussed on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s muscular leadership, national security and Hindu-Muslim divisions.
Travelling through the heart of eastern and central U.P. during the election campaign, it was hard to detect a Modi wave. But it was equally difficult to overlook his popularity among the upper castes, youth and non-Yadav backward castes who want him back as Prime Minister. Mr. Modi had promised much on the development front to U.P. but there is disappointment about how little he has delivered. Big cities such as Lucknow, Varanasi and Allahabad have experienced economic expansion even as the older parts of these cities and peripheries are stagnating. Driven by real estate development, economic expansion basically means widening of roads (it was aptly described as ‘Sadak Chaap vikas’, or superficial development, by someone in Allahabad), swanky shopping malls and dazzling showrooms signalling changing lifestyles in urban U.P. But nearly 78% of U.P.’s population lives in rural areas, and this sizeable rural majority has not fared well as the Central and State governments have failed to address their needs. The deepening distress in the agricultural sector has hardly been addressed. Nor has the problem of stray cattle, which is damaging crops in the rural areas, been addressed.
There is much talk about government schemes which have benefited some people. However, differential access to government schemes such as toilets, gas connections and loans to build homes was highlighted in several conversations in central U.P., and this has contributed to growing anger, particularly among Dalits and Muslims, who feel that they’ve been left out. We asked a group of women in Faizabad if they supported Mr. Modi. They said they did, but not with a certainty that withstood further probing. Soon enough they admitted that they said so out of fear and would not vote for him because his government had not delivered on promises, especially employment opportunities essential for their material well-being.
The 2014 singularity
The 2014 election ushered in the era of BJP-dominance in U.P. The party had gained ground in the State after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 199 2 and the campaign to construct a Ram temple in Ayodhya. This helped in the long run to win political power and gave a boost to its majoritarian project. The year 2017 saw the BJP deepen its electoral dominance of U.P. by winning a three-fourths majority in the Assembly elections. Yogi Adityanath’s appointment as Chief Minister was a turning point in State politics with disenfranchisement and polarisation being weaponised to strengthen the process of Hindu consolidation. He has played a key part in polarising the electorate by openly speaking about the 80-20 equation (20% being Muslims).
The BJP’s rise has been marked by the strong resurgence in the representation of traditional elite groups by virtue of being over-represented within the BJP. The upper castes harboured strong resentment over their displacement in the post-Mandal era. BJP rule has been the vehicle for their comeback, as upper castes have regained positions of authority and influence. Simultaneously, the BJP has expanded its outreach to lower castes by leveraging social services provided by the government and giving representation to non-Yadav castes, which has enhanced recognition of these castes owing to their proximity to power. Adding them to the core upper caste voters has helped the party in building a formidable coalition in the State.
The rising power of the BJP has also led to a significant change in the behaviour of non-BJP, non-Congress parties. There is a realisation that the canvas of politics has to be much larger and the scope much broader to stall further expansion of the BJP. The success in the Gorakhpur, Phulpur and Kairana by-elections showed the way to the SP and BSP, the two social justice parties, that they must do business together. Bitter rivals for decades, they decided to bury the hatchet and join ranks to form an alliance driven by the overwhelming objective of defeating the BJP. The coming together of these two forces is what makes 2019 different from 2014.
Mandal 2.0
The new coalition of Yadavs, Jatavs and Muslims poses a serious challenge to Mr. Modi as he seeks re-election. The defining feature of Mandal 2.0, the second avatar of identity politics, is political power and social arithmetic, and not social justice, leave alone combining social justice and secularism. Even so, the counter-polemic has shaken the foundations of the BJP’s caste politics as it signposts Hindutva’s failure to subsume identity politics. The party’s caste dilemma persists because its own electoral success is predicated on caste-based social engineering. The role of Muslims in Mandal 2.0 is critical. It is clear that they are determined to vote out the BJP and are likely to have voted strategically and largely in favour of the mahagathbandhan. The numerical heft of Muslims in the mahagathbandhan underlines their relevance in U.P. politics, but it also underlines the limits of the BJP strategy of keeping them out.
There’s a stark gap between the BJP’s rhetoric of caste inclusion and the reality. It has consistently over-represented upper castes in its highest ranks in U.P. In the State Assembly, the overall representation of upper castes increased from 32.7% in 2012 to 44.4% in 2017. This contradicts the claim that the BJP has become an inclusive social platform. In spite of the five-year rule of a party ostensibly committed to vikas (development) for everyone, U.P. remains unequal and poor. In fact, even talk of vikas is off the table as the BJP is pushing voters to look beyond their material well-being.
Original battleground
The U.P. model has been central to the Sangh’s Hindutva agenda much before the Gujarat model gained prominence. U.P. is still the key to the BJP’s electoral fortunes and to the future creation of a Hindu state. Whatever the 2019 verdict, we must place the BJP’s recent advances within the longer history of U.P. politics, which has witnessed momentous changes in the last hundred years. In the shifting sands of U.P. politics, Hindu nationalism has certainly gained primacy in recent decades but this too will change.
Zoya Hasan is Professor Emerita, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Distinguished Professor, Council for Social Development, New Delhi
