In election year, BJP set to cash in on rural poll win

LUCKNOW: Undeterred by the opposition’s massive criticism about the conduct of panchayat polls, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has decided to play up its first ever sweep of rural elections in Uttar Pradesh (UP) in the run up to the 2022 assembly polls

LUCKNOW: Undeterred by the opposition’s massive criticism about the conduct of panchayat polls, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has decided to play up its first ever sweep of rural elections in Uttar Pradesh (UP) in the run up to the 2022 assembly polls.

HT Image

These wins, party strategists believed, had not only ended the domination of opposition parties, mainly the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party, in rural UP but also helped demolish the ‘myth’ that farmers were unhappy with the BJP governments at the centre and the state, a party leader said.

The party has decided to felicitate newly elected block development council (BDC) members and gram pradhans or village heads at 825 blocks at the local level between July 26 to 31 and after that it would felicitate district panchayat chairpersons and kshetra panchayat (block pramukhs) chairpersons in the state capital.

The wins hailed by top party leadership would also be an integral part of the party’s election campaign and would be mentioned prominently in its meetings, BJP leaders said.

The plan for felicitation of rural representatives, including gram pradhans or village heads, was shared by UP BJP general secretary (organisation) Sunil Bansal before the party leadership at the virtual state working committee meeting on Friday.

These newly elected members in rural UP would also be used to spread ‘vaccine awareness’ as well as to ensure that Covid protocol was followed. The party also intends to deploy health volunteers in rural UP.

“In each of the nearly 56,000 villages and 12,,000 wards, two health volunteers including a woman, would be deployed. We intend to create ‘swasthya swayamsevaks’ (health volunteers) and these volunteers would be screened and tasked with their responsibilities before July 20,” Bansal said.

A village-centric three-day special vaccination campaign would also be carried out from July 23, that would focus on drivers, rickshaw-pullers and vegetable vendors. “They may be working in urban areas, but all of them have a rural background,” a BJP leader said,, explaining that in the run up to 2022 UP polls the party’s rural focus would continue.

“As you know,, 299 of the 403 assembly segments have a rural character and that’s why national general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh has repeatedly been focusing on concentrating in rural areas,” a BJP leader said, adding it was for this reason that the recent sweep of rural UP was special for the party.

“A special booth verification campaign, a drive to ensure that most villagers have access to free ration scheme of the government would also be undertaken,” a BJP leader said.

The ruling BJP said candidates backed by the party won 67 of the 75 zila panchayat chairpersons’ posts and 648 of the 825 block pramukh or kshetra panchayat chairpersons’ posts.

In 2015, when the Samajwadi Party government was in power, it had won 623 of the 816 seats for the block pramukh polls and 60 of the 74 zila panchayat chairpersons’ post. After SP, BSP had won the most seats in rural UP. That is the reason why the BJP leaders feel that the party’s domination in these rural polls was an important development.

As to the criticism of misuse of official machinery and the fact that the party in power usually sweeps these indirect elections to the zila panchayat and kshetra panchayat chairpersons’ posts, top ministers in the Yogi Adityanath government said a move to provide for direct elections was also under consideration.

“It is under consideration,” deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said while targeting Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who had on Saturday visited a Samajwadi Party’s woman worker whose saree was pulled by some people, alleged to be BJP workers, in Pasgawa block of Lakhimpur Kheri. After her meeting, Priyanka demanded cancellation of polls in all such areas where violence was unleashed. The Samajwadi Party had played up the incident as ‘disrobing’ of democracy by the BJP.

In January 2020, the then additional state election commissioner Ved Prakash Verma had written to the state government to consider the proposal of amending the clause in the 73rd Constitutional Amendment that provides for indirect elections to these zila panchayat chairpersons’ and block pramukh posts.

HT is in possession of the letter written by Verma to principal secretary, Panchayati Raj favouring a proposal for direct elections to zila panchayat chairpersons and block pramukh polls.

“That missive was sent in response to a centre’s query of December 30, 2019 to the state on the subject. The point is that only the parliament can carry out an amendment if direct elections are to be held for zila panchayat and block level chief’s posts. And that means it would have to be considered at the appropriate level,” an official said.