In the last 18 years, the rain-starved Bundelkhand has seen drought for 13 intermittent years despite the presence of seven rivers and 20 dams in the seven districts that constitute the region.
And yet, ironically, water shortage, lack of irrigation facilities, and massive migration from rural areas for job have failed to emerge as poll planks in Jhansi-Lalitpur, Hamirpur, Banda and Jalaun — Lok Sabha seats spread across seven districts of Bundelkhand in Uttar Pradesh.
Bundelkhand’s biggest urban nerve centre — Jhansi taken together with adjacent district of Lalitpur — constitutes the most important Lok Sabha constituency. Caste affinity, law and order, and personal security are issues bothering voters. Water conservationist Dr Sanjay Singh said, “In the previous Samajwadi Party regime during 2012-17, members of the dominant Yadav community earned enough notoriety for land grabbing, arm-twisting, atrocities against other OBCs and Scheduled Castes. After Yogi became the Chief Minister, that ominous situation has significantly changed.
“This has deeply impacted the non-Yadav OBCs and most of the Scheduled Caste communities who could well be a great advantage to the BJP,” he said. Of the total of 19 lakh voters in Jhansi-Lalitpur constituency, Ahirwars and Kushwahas with nearly four lakh voters are the most sought after blocs. They are tailed by 2 lakh Brahmins, 1.60 lakh Yadavs and 1.50 lakh Lodhis. However, the deciding factors could be the 1.5 lakh Muslim voters, besides a considerable number of traders, including Jains, especially in Lalitpur.
Caste factor seemed to have weighed heavily on the leadership of various parties in the selection of candidates. While the Congress has fielded prominent Kushwaha face, Shiv Sharan Kushwaha, the SP-BSP-RLD alliance has put its money on Shyam Sundar Singh Yadav and Pragatishil Samajwadi Party (Lohia) has given ticket to Jagat Vikram Singh Rajput from Lodh community. The BJP has fielded noted industrialist and Managing Director of Ayurveda medicine major Baidyanath — Anurag Sharma.
In the yesteryears, Sharma’s father too represented Jhansi and Hamirpur as a Member of Parliament.
Top leaders of all major political parties have visited the seven districts of the region seeking support for respective candidates. A road show by Congress general secretary and East UP in-charge Priyanka Gandhi on Thursday attracted huge crowd in Jhansi.
Similarly, a rally by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath also saw huge turnout.
Despite having 65 per cent voters from the Scheduled Caste and Other Backward Castes, Jhansi-Lalitpur constituency has been nobody’s citadel In fact, the seat has been changing hands from time to time.
BJP candidate Rajendra Agnihotri represented the seat for 10 years from 1989. But his stint was cut short by Congress candidate Sujan Singh Bundela in 1999. In 2004, Samajwadi Party tasted its first victory but it was wrested by Congress Pradeep Jain Aditya in 2009. In the last general elections, in 2014, BJP’s firebrand leader Sadhvi Uma Bharti won the seat back for the BJP with a whopping margin of 1.90 lakh by polling about 43 per cent of the total votes.