Samajwadi Party, which has remained dormant for the last over four years, after being defeated by the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2017 UP Assembly polls, faces an uphill task of having a credible political narrative to take on the ruling party in the 2022 UP Assembly elections.
Though the SP was upbeat after its good performance in the panchayat polls held in April, the wisdom is dawning on the party leadership that panchayat elections have little bearing on the Assembly polls.
The SP has lost three consecutive elections on its principal turf -- 2014 Lok Sabha polls, 2017 UP assembly polls and 2019 Lok Sabha polls. For the last four years, the SP was hardly seen or heard except during an odd by-poll and made no impact in the legislative assembly and the legislative council polls.
Political observers say that the SP has so far offered no credible explanation as to why it has remained dormant for the last four years despite being the principal opposition party and giving a walkover to the ruling BJP.
“During the Bahujan Samaj Party rule from 2007 to 2012, the SP made effective efforts to come back to power in the state and launched sustained state-wide agitations against the Mayawati regime. Its efforts and hard work paid rich dividends and the party for the first time was voted to power in 2012 with a clear majority in the assembly. We have not witnessed such effort by the SP to come back to power in the last four years since 2017,” said political analyst Prof Abhay Dube.
Moreover, Dube said, “the politics of social justice has been tried and tested during the last three decades and these leaders have enjoyed the comforts of power and made fortunes and they have lost the grit and vigour to again move on the path of social justice”.
“The erstwhile protagonist of politics of social justice like the SP and BSP are living in self-created castles in air that the BJP is very unpopular and the people will vote for them and they will come back to power,” said a political analyst, adding that it amounted to political hara-kiri.
A political analyst pointed out that the BJP was restless after the setbacks in the recent panchayat elections and they were holding marathon meetings to find out where they erred and were anxious to set their house in order ahead of 2022 UP assembly elections but no such activity was visible in the opposition camps.
Abhay Dube argued, “Elections are round the corner, but you do not see any political movement by the Samajwadi Party to build up a political atmosphere to attract people as they are confident that they will be the natural choice of the people in 2022 assembly elections’.”
He added that the SP was confident that it would easily capitalise on the failures of the BJP without hitting the street and this was going in favour of the ruling party.
The SP leaders are busy creating the perception that the non-Jatav and non-Yadav OBCs were disillusioned with the BJP and they would vote against the ruling party in 2022.
“No such sentiments are visible on the ground. The OBCs remain deprived and have got nothing from the politics of social justice and it is not possible that their political preference will change overnight and they will vote for the Samajwadi party or the Bahujan Samaj Party,” Dube argued.