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Rumblings in Uttar Pradesh BJP over poll post-mortem

By, Lucknow/new Delhi
Jul 18, 2024 08:58 AM IST

At the heart of the divide is the BJP’s poor Lok Sabha performance, which saw the party’s tally fall from 62 to 33 with serious setbacks in erstwhile strongholds such as Faizabad (Ayodhya), eastern UP and places such as Amethi

The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) first major introspection of its underwhelming Lok Sabha elections showing in Uttar Pradesh has triggered rumblings within the party’s state unit, amid political posturing and fevered speculation at a string of high-profile meetings in Delhi and Lucknow this week.

BJP leaders at the party’s state executive meeting on July 14. (FILE PHOTO)
BJP leaders at the party’s state executive meeting on July 14. (FILE PHOTO)

Union home minister Amit Shah met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday evening, hours after UP state BJP chief Chaudhary Bhupendra Singh called on the latter. This was the latest in a series of meetings that included party chief JP Nadda meeting Singh and deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya separately on Tuesday, and Nadda presiding over the UP state executive meeting on Sunday where the speculation first began.

Separately, UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath projected control as he met senior state ministers in Lucknow and held his own election review meetings, calling on governor Anandiben Patel in the evening to ostensibly discuss the upcoming session of the UP legislature.

Maurya, an other backward classes (OBC) leader who is known to be a detractor of the chief minister, set off speculation first with his speech on Sunday and then a post on X on Wednesday hours after his meeting in Delhi with Nadda.

“The organisation is bigger than the government, the pain of the workers is my pain. No one is bigger than the organisation, the workers are the pride,” his office posted on X on Wednesday in what appeared to be a jab at the head of the state government, Adityanath.

Officially, the BJP dismissed any speculation of infighting and sought to project a united face in possibly the most politically crucial state. Asked about apparent differences between the government and the party organisation, BJP state president Bhupendra Chaudhary said, “There are no differences. We are working together, focusing on upcoming bypolls.”

But leaders aware of developments said the factionalism was not only limited to the state unit but also involved senior central leaders who were unhappy with the showing of the party in the state in the Lok Sabha polls. They added that even some of the BJP’s allies were concerned about UP.

Nishad party chief Sanjay Nishad blamed bulldozers on Tuesday, saying some officials were making an already bad environment worse. Nishad said, “The bulldozer should be used against the mafias and land grabbers. If it is used to demolish the houses of the poor people who do not have proper land document, then they will get mobilised to defeat us in elections. There are several cases of arbitrary action of officers who have demolished the houses of the people on their whim. The state government should rehabilitate the people before moving them from encroached areas. Along with development, the government should understand the pain of the common people.”

“Some leaders have conveyed that the party unit was in a state of disarray, there were camps and groups that worked at cross purposes, which eventually led to an unexpected dip in numbers,” said a party functionary, requesting anonymity.

The Opposition took potshots at the apparent infighting.

“In the heat of BJP’s fight for power, governance and administration in UP have been put on the back burner. The work of sabotage politics that the BJP used to do in other parties is now being done inside its party. That is why BJP is sinking in the quagmire of internal conflicts. There is no one in BJP who thinks about the public,” Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav posted on X.

A separate post on X by the SP named Maurya, who lost his assembly election in 2022 but remained deputy CM due to the importance of the OBC vote. “Keshav Prasad Maurya is repeatedly busy shaking CM Yogi’s chair...he gets power from Delhi and he starts targeting CM, then he goes to Delhi, and in return gets nothing.”

At the heart of the divide is the BJP’s poor Lok Sabha performance, which saw the party’s tally fall from 62 to 33 with serious setbacks in erstwhile strongholds such as Faizabad (Ayodhya) where the Ram Temple consecration had given the party a boost, eastern UP and places such as Amethi. The BJP not only failed to become the single-largest party, losing out to the Samajwadi Party that won 37 seats, but also saw Modi’s victory margin in the prestige seat of Varanasi shrink from 479,000 to 152,000.

Shortly after the shocking results – seen as representative of the BJP’s unravelling caste coalition and slipping support among marginalised castes, especially OBCs and Dalits – several leaders spoke out about the problems that beset the party in its stronghold state.

Some leaders, especially those close to Maurya and some central leaders, blamed the Yogi government’s performance and his alleged reliance on bureaucrats that they argued alienated local workers. They also said that a Thakur CM had failed to attract OBCs and Dalits.

When asked none of the party leaders agreed to come on record.

But others close to the chief minister rejected the allegations, arguing that the CM had little role in deciding the strategy or candidates, and only focussed on campaigning. They said the losses were due to faulty slogans and poor ground management, and pointed out that the party had done well in Adityanath’s home turf of Gorakhpur.

In addition to local meetings, BJP general secretary (organisation) BL Santosh also visited Lucknow on July 6 and 7, meeting the CM and both deputy CMs, Maurya and Brajesh Pathak. But behind the scenes bickering spilled out in the open on Sunday at the BJP executive meeting.

Both Singh and Nadda praised the Yogi government for development, and improving law-and-order, but Maurya struck a discordant note. “Organisation is, was, and will always remain bigger than the government. My doors at 7, Kalidas Marg are always open for party workers,” he said, advising senior leaders to respect party workers, articulating a view among some that the state government had not listened to local BJP leaders.

Adityanath didn’t respond directly to him, but in his speech, blamed overconfidence for the poor results.

“Vote- shifting and overconfidence hurt our expectations. The opposition, which had previously been on a ventilator, has now got some oxygen,” Adityanath said at the concluding session of the day-long state BJP executive meeting on July 14.

Relations between the two were already strained, with Maurya skipping at least two cabinet meetings in recent weeks with Maurya attending only cabinet meeting since June 4.

Uttar Pradesh, considered India’s most politically important state, is key to the plans of a BJP still grappling with the loss of its parliamentary majority. Adityanath, a surprise pick after the BJP won in a landslide in 2017, has consolidated his position by projecting a tough image predicated on position as chief of the Gorakhnath Mutt and his focus on controversial law-and-order tactics such as using bulldozers and police encounters against people accused of crimes. In 2022, he became the first man in a generation to win back-to-back electoral mandates in the state.

But the party is also struggling to win back the support of smaller OBC and Dalit groups, which were crucial to its unprecedented success in 2017, 2019 and 2022.

This loss of marginalised castes was the reason for its shock loss in erstwhile strongholds such as Faizabad.

“There is a possibility that the deputy CM, an OBC face of the party who has the backing of the RSS (the ideological fount of the BJP) may be given an organisational position,” said the functionary cited above.

“Maurya’s discomfort with Yogi Adityanath is also no secret... therefore, a new role for him will not be surprising,” the functionary added.

Despite the speculation reaching a fever pitch, there was another view that there might be little movement till a clutch of by-elections are concluded, said leaders aware of development. Assembly bypolls to 10 seats – five held by the SP, three by the BJP and two by National Democratic Alliance members – are likely to be held alongside state elections in Maharashtra and Haryana later this year.

The party’s performance in the bypolls could well dictate its next move.

A political observer and former head of Lucknow University political science department Professor SK Dwivedi said, “The BJP central leadership will not indulge in any political experiment in U.P. till the assembly by-elections.”

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