The results of the recent Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council (MLC) elections have triggered a fresh political debate in the state.
The Samajwadi Party (SP), which secured five of the eleven contested seats, has presented its performance as a sign of growing public dissatisfaction with the BJP government. Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has suggested that the results reflect an anti-incumbency wave across nearly 50 districts of Uttar Pradesh. Sections of the media and social media have also amplified this narrative, projecting the outcome as a possible indication of a major political shift ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections. However, a closer examination of the election results tells a somewhat different story. Out of the eleven contested seats, the BJP won six, while the SP secured five. Closer scrutiny tells a different story altogether.
Three of the SP's victories-Varanasi Graduates, Varanasi Teachers, and Allahabad-Jhansi Graduates-were seats the party had already held in 2020. Retaining existing constituencies is certainly important, but it cannot automatically be described as a major electoral breakthrough. The Agra Teachers constituency also requires a closer look. The winning candidate, Akash Agrawal, had contested the previous election as an Independent before securing victory on an SP ticket. Therefore, his victory represents the addition of an existing political figure to the party rather than an entirely new grassroots electoral breakthrough.
In this context, Lucknow Graduates remains the only direct seat that the SP wrested from the BJP.The BJP, meanwhile, lost the Lucknow Graduates seat but compensated for this setback by winning the Gorakhpur-Faizabad Teachers constituency. Consequently, the party retained its previous tally of six seats, maintaining the same numerical strength as in the 2020 election cycle. For a ruling party facing the challenge of prolonged incumbency, retaining its overall position in a specialised electoral contest indicates a degree of organisational resilience. One of the most significant aspects of these elections is the BJP's performance among the teaching community. The party secured four out of the six Teachers' constituencies, improving its performance compared with 2020.
This is politically important because teachers represent an organised and professionally connected section of society that remains closely associated with educational policies, institutional reforms, employment conditions, and administrative decisions. Their voting behaviour can offer useful insights into the political preferences of a particular segment of the educated electorate.
If widespread dissatisfaction with the government had been the defining feature of these elections, one might have expected a more substantial setback for the ruling party in these constituencies. Instead, the BJP managed to maintain a strong electoral presence.The victory margins further strengthen this argument. In the Bareilly-Moradabad Teachers constituency, BJP candidate Dr Hari Singh Dhillon secured more than five times the votes received by his SP rival, winning by a margin of over 17,600 votes. Similarly, in Lucknow Teachers, incumbent Umesh Dwivedi crossed the required winning quota comfortably on the basis of first-preference votes alone.
In contrast, some of the SP's victories, including Agra Teachers, required the transfer of secondary-preference votes to cross the winning quota. These results suggest that the BJP's performance was not merely a consequence of narrow victories but reflected considerable electoral strength in several constituencies.The regional pattern of the results also deserves attention. The BJP performed particularly well in western Uttar Pradesh and the Rohilkhand region, securing victories across the Meerut and Bareilly-Moradabad divisions. The SP failed to win a seat in these important regional belts. This is significant because western Uttar Pradesh has its own distinctive social, agricultural, economic, and caste-based political dynamics. The SP's improved overall tally, therefore, does not necessarily translate into uniform regional influence. Electoral performance must be assessed not simply through the total number of seats won but also through geographical distribution, victory margins, and the nature of the constituencies.There are certain truths that prevail over falsehood. Data explains.
First, victory in Graduates or Teachers segmented seats of Vidhan Parishad is not an indication of Vidhan Sabha or Lok Sabha elections. The percentage of votes in the MLC election is less than one per cent of the total votes of registered voters. Current results verify this truth.
Second, the percentage of voting is also very low, much lower than in Vidhan Sabha or Lok Sabha.
Third, the state government is formed through Assembly elections, not through the Vidhan Parishad, which is the upper house of the state. Fourth, from 2010 to 2022, consecutive results of MLCs and Assembly Elections mismatch and just opposite. Under Mayawati's government, the BSP swept 31 out of 36 Local Authorities MLC seats in early 2010 and held a firm grip on council berths. The Samajwadi Party won a clear majority with 224 seats in 2012; the BSP was reduced to 80 seats. In March 2016, the ruling Akhilesh Yadav-led SP won 31 of 36 Local Authorities MLC seats.
The BJP won barely 2 seats. In March 2017, the BJP and allies won a massive mandate of 325 seats (BJP alone won 312), while SP collapsed to 47 seats. A near-total clean sweep of council seats by the ruling party just one year earlier offered zero predictive power for mass public sentiment. In the December 2020 Graduate and Teacher MLC polls, the SP made notable breakthroughs (winning Varanasi Graduate and Allahabad-Jhansi Graduate seats), which the opposition framed as urban/youth backlash against the BJP.
The BJP alliance won a decisive majority (273 seats) in 2022, securing re-election with a higher vote share despite SP gains.MLC elections are fundamentally different from Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections. While general elections involve almost the entire adult population, elections to Graduates' and Teachers' constituencies are restricted to specific categories of registered voters. Consequently, the electorate represents only a small section of the wider population.
Ultimately, the 2027 Assembly elections will be decided by a much wider electorate and a far more complex set of political considerations. Issues such as employment, inflation, law and order, infrastructure, education, healthcare, welfare delivery, caste representation, and overall development will shape the choices of millions of voters across villages, towns, and cities. The political preferences of a limited number of registered graduates and teachers cannot substitute for the collective verdict of the state's electorate.
The writer is Professor of Political Science, IGNOU