2024 Lok Sabha elections: Hindutva, caste dynamics key to BJP’s firm grip on Unnao
The BJP’s Sakshi Maharaj is seeking a third straight win from Unnao and is confident of a big margin with the backing of communities settled along the Ganga. He is up against the SP’s Annu Tandon and the BSP’s Ashok Kumar Pandey
The Ganga, which flows majestically in the heartland of Uttar Pradesh in Unnao, and the communities settled along its banks are integral to electoral fortunes in this Lok Sabha constituency, said to be one of the largest in terms of size in the country.
For generations, the Lodhi, Bind, Nishad, its sub-caste Kashyap and Kahaar communities have looked to the Ganga for their livelihood in the feudal society of Unnao due to historical and socio-political factors.
The communities are again at the centre of Unnao politics in the 2024 general elections. The Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Sachchidanand Sakshi Maharaj, known for his controversial statements, is looking for a third straight term from this seat.
The political grip of Sakshi Maharaj, a Lodhi by caste, is firmly on the communities settled along the Ganga since the BJP moved him to this constituency from Farrukhabad in 2014.
Maharaj claims the issue is not whether he will win but by how much and claims the margin could top five lakh votes this time. He won the 2014 Lok Sabha election by 3.10 lakh votes and the 2019 polls by 4.9 lakh. He polled 7.3 lakh votes or 56.3 % of the total votes when the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party contested together in 2019, and their joint candidate Arun Shukla Anna garnered 3.12 lakh votes.
This time, the SP is in alliance with the Congress and has given the ticket to former MP Annu Tandon who, before the 2022 assembly elections, moved from the Congress to the SP after losing two consecutive polls.
Elected to the Lok Sabha on the Congress ticket in 2009, Tandon is a local. She was born and raised here. Besides local politics, she has been engaged in philanthropy since 2000 and is considered close to a top industrialist’s family. The BSP has fielded former journalist Ashok Kumar Pandey, a Brahmin.
SN Bajpai, a political observer, said the BJP holds all the six assembly seats-- Bangarmau, Safipur, Mohan, Unnao, Bhagwant Nagar and Purwa-- in Unnao, a district where politics revolves around caste dynamics. Despite being seen as a stronghold of the SP and BSP in the past, the BJP has managed to assert its dominance by employing a strategic blend of Hindutva and caste dynamics.
“In caste-driven politics, the Ganga becomes the decisive factor. The ebb and flow of communities influences the election outcome. The shifting allegiances of communities has strongly been observed to sway the elections. Whether it is Lodhi, Bind, Nishad and others, their collective move tips the balance in electoral contests,” said Bajpai.
“This dynamic interplay underscores the intricate relationship between demographics and political power,” he added.
The Ganga flows along about 900 villages in Unnao, each with 60% to 65% population of communities like Lodhis, Nishads and Pasis among others.
Out of the 2.3 million (23 lakh) voters, upper castes and Muslims constitute nine lakh voters, said Mirza Arif Beg, a social scientist.
Rae Bareli was a part of the Unnao constituency in the first general election in 1952. The first MP Vishambhar Dayal Tripathi was one of the founders of the Forward Bloc and among the closest aides of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. He later moved to the Congress and remained an MP till his death in 1959.
The Congress won this seat eight times before losing it to Anwar Ahmed of the Janata Dal in 1989. Between 1991 and 1999, the seat remained with the BJP’s Devi Bux Singh.
The Samajwadi Party’s Deepak Kumar and the Bahujan Samaj Party’s Brajesh Pathak, who is now with the BJP and holds the post of Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister, won the Unnao seat in the 1999 and the 2004 elections, respectively.
Vipin Trivedi, who teaches political science in a degree college, said Unnao politics underwent a change from 1991 onwards and communities along the Ganga became electorally dominant.
These communities sided with the BJP for three elections and supported Devi Bux Singh but unexpectedly backed SP’s Deepak Kumar, a Nishad, in 1999 when Atal Bihari Vajpayee formed the BJP-led government at the Centre. Similarly, the communities became a vital cog in BSP’s social engineering to bring Brahmins and backward communities together.
“The departure of Lodhi leaders like Kalyan Singh and Sakshi Maharaj from the BJP about two decades ago (both returned to the party later) clearly had an impact on the Ganga communities and their voting behaviour changed,” said Trivedi.
The experiment was a success in Unnao where, in 2004, Pathak became the first Brahmin since Krishna Dev Tripathi in 1971 to win this seat. In 2009, the communities responded to Annu Tandon working with them through a family-controlled trust infused with corporate culture, which allowed effective engagement.
Before contesting in Unnao, Sakshi Maharaj had been an MP thrice, once from Mathura in 1991 and twice from Farrukhabad.
Fielded by the BJP from Unnao in 2014, he focused heavily on these communities, which were divided between the SP and the BSP.