BJP has golden numbers to roll out big ticket projects in UP ahead of 2024 LS polls

The saffron party has notched up numbers it never had earlier in various municipal corporations of UP. The party could readmit those who had rebelled, contested as independents and won the civic polls. If that happens, the BJP’s overall strength in the corporations would go up further

LUCKNOW Bharatiya Janata Party’s decisive sweep in the urban local body polls has given it a majority in all the 17 municipal corporations of the state, providing it an opportunity to steamroll big ticket projects ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections without the opposition’s intervention.

Nearly decimated in these corporations, there is much focus on if the opposition parties would mull a joint strategy against the BJP. (Pic for representation)

With less than a year to go for the LS polls, the BJP leadership is said to be working on projects that the boards of the new corporations could clear in their first meeting itself.

The BJP has notched up numbers it never had before in various municipal corporations. What’s more, the party could re-admit those who had rebelled and contested as independents and won the local body polls, some party leaders said. If that happens, the BJP’s overall strength in the corporations would go up further.

“The Modi-Yogi (M-Y) factor dominated these polls, and so like our double engine governments, the corporations too would definitely come up with projects that will better the infrastructure and bring a smile on the faces of the poor,” said UP BJP spokesman Hero Bajpai.

Nearly decimated in these corporations, there is much focus on if the opposition parties would mull a joint strategy against the BJP.

“Sans the BSP, the opposition has been talking of uniting against the BJP in 2024 Lok Sabha polls. So will these corporations, where the BJP holds a decisive sway, become the first test to check that unity,” asked Athar Siddiqui of the Centre for Objective Research and Development.

Take Prayagraj for instance. Here, despite the BJP emerging third from Mohitsamganj ward number 80, under which UP minister Nand Gopal Nandi’s residence is located, the party has won 56 seats in the 100-member Prayagraj house against Samajwadi Party’s 16 and BSP’s 2.

In 2017, the BJP, despite having its own mayor, had managed to win only 22, providing the opposition an edge as 24 SP members had won then. The BSP had three members.

Despite some independents also joining the BJP in Prayagraj in the previous house, the majority had eluded the ruling party still. There was much focus on Prayagraj this time, as this was the first poll after the killing of gangster-politicians Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf.

During his campaign here, chief minister Yogi Adityanath had even recited a couplet from the Ramcharitmanas, the Hindu holy book, in what was interpreted as a veiled counter to critics who questioned the way the gangster brothers were killed in police custody. Adityanath had recited: “Karm pradhan vishwa rachi rakha, jo jas karihey to tas phal chakha (as you sow, so shall you reap)”, drawing much applause.

Adityanath’s clout was visible in Gorakhpur, his political and spiritual ‘karmabhoomi’ from where the head priest of Gorakhnath Mutt, after being elected Lok Sabha MP for five consecutive terms, is now an MLA. Here, the BJP has won 42 seats in the 80-member house (including Haqikun Nisha, the only Muslim corporator from BJP here), becoming the first party here to form a majority board since 1995, when it was granted the status of a corporation. The opposition here has been limited to Samajwadi Party (17 seats) followed by independents (15). In 2017, the BJP had 27 members.

Agra, regarded as the Dalit capital of the state, also saw BJP members winning 67 seats in the 100-member house against its 2017 tally of 53. Here, there was some good news for the BSP, which has otherwise fared poorly in all elections post 2022 UP polls, in which it won just a solitary seat.

The BSP, which claims loyalty of Dalits, has seen its tally rise this time marginally from 22 to 27 seats while SP, despite its pro-Dalit overtures, dipped from seven seats in 2017 to three now.

In Shahjahanpur, BJP veteran and state’s finance minister Suresh Khanna pulled off a coup at the last moment by getting SP’s mayoral candidate to join the BJP and made her its mayoral candidate. The ruling party won 41 of the 60 wards, giving it considerable heft in a place from where Samajwadi Party had been dominating Nagar Palika polls since the last four occasions. The SP failed to open its account in the new municipal corporation house here as relatives of local functionaries of the party lost.

In Bareilly, the BJP won 52 seats in the 80-member corporation, the first time that any party has secured such numbers. The main opposition SP was a distant second with 12 seats, followed by independents.

Even Lucknow, which has been voting for a BJP mayor since 1995, had never seen the kind of majority that the party has now got with 80 seats in the 110-member house. In 2017, the BJP had won 59 seats here. This time, SP has won 21 seats here, 7 less than in 2017 while the Congress and BSP hardly mattered with inconsequential numbers.

The BJP’s dominance would also be visible in other municipal corporations like Jhansi and Saharanpur (both 38 members each), Varanasi and Kanpur (both 63 members each), Ayodhya and Mathura (27 and 36 members, respectively), Aligarh (45), Firozabad (32), Meerut (42) and Moradabad (35).

In 2017, the BJP had 21 members in Jhansi, 28 in Saharanpur, 40 in Varanasi, 58 in Kanpur, 30 in Ayodhya, 41 in Mathura, 35 in Aligarh, 19 in Firozabad, 36 in Meerut and 35 in Moradabad.

The Samajwadi Party now hasn’t touched even the double-figure mark in several corporations, including Shahjahanpur and Jhansi, where the party failed to open its account, Saharanpur (3), Ghaziabad (3), Agra (3), Mathura (2) and Moradabad (3). The BSP fared even worse, failing to open its account in Varanasi, Kanpur, Shahjahanpur and Bareilly, figuring in single digits in Lucknow (1), Jhansi (7), Saharanpur (7), Ghaziabad (5), Mathura (5), Ayodhya (3), Aligarh (7), Firozabad (7), Meerut (6) and Moradabad (2).

The Congress continues to be irrelevant in these corporations and while parties like AAP and AIMIM did well in select seats, overall, none of the opposition parties have numbers to challenge the BJP in the municipal corporations.

“These are golden numbers that the BJP should use to roll out development projects and to help the common man,” said Siddiqui.