Core voters desert BSP and SP in Uttar Pradesh
The decimation of the Bahujan Samaj Party and the near obliteration of the Samajwadi Party in the politically most crucial State of Uttar Pradesh tell the story of how caste mathematics, which these two parties had mastered, collapsed in this lok Sabha election. It is the people's complete rejection of caste-based voting that has produced arguably the most sensational result as part of the overall massive mandate that the Bharatiya Janata Party has received. Both the State's regional heavyweights put together could not even get double-digit numbers. While the BSP was totally wiped out as it got zero number of seats, the SP managed to secure five, with all its winners coming from SP founder Mulayam Singh Yadav's family. The net gainer was the BJP which had approached the people on the plank of good governance and non-discrimination. The result shows that the people have trusted the BJP's approach of genuine equality instead of the promises of entitlement without real empowerment the SP and the BSP had made. There is no way the BJP could have won the more than as 70-plus seats out of the 80 on offer in the State without large chunks of the core voters of both the BSP and the SP switching sides. While there had been indications during the election campaign itself that people, impressed by Mr Narendra Modi's repeated assurance of development for all, were in a mood to break the caste-based mould, the extent to which that would happen remained a subject of heated discussion. It is now clear that the shift away from caste-based voting has been tectonic. Although Ms Mayawati's BSP secured 20 per cent of the votes, the party could not open its account. This is not just a terrible humiliation for a party that has ruled the State in the recent past and has had a committed vote-bank, but a rejection of the very premise on which the party has grown over the decades. The 20 per cent vote share did not convert into seats because the votes were spread out thinly across the State. In other words, unlike in the past, the party could not gain enough critical mass in any one constituency that could result in a victory. This can only mean that the BSP got far fewer of its dedicated votes than before. A big section of the Scheduled Caste voters crossed over to the BJP. left with a truncated vote-bank, a split in the Muslim votes on which it had banked and the aversion of the upper castes (which had in the past chipped in for her when they were upset with the SP) to back it, Ms Mayawati's BSP came a cropper.
In the same vein, the SP has paid the price for minority appeasement. It was not just the party's non-Yadav voters that were upset with the games that the SP had been playing by pampering the minority community. Even the Yadav supporters, who had in recent years and more so in the last Assembly election, whole-heartedly backed the party, had been furious. The consolidation of non-Yadavs — and a considerable section of the Yadav votes in addition — left the party stranded. The role of the SP's prominent leader and minority community rabble-rouser, Mr Mohammed Azam Khan, in alienating large numbers of non-Muslim voters, cannot be underestimated. It is to be seen whether the SP and the BSP will at least now give up their sectarian politics.