Especially with the monsoon session of Parliament having started yesterday, it is passé to state that the road to Delhi wends its way through Uttar Pradesh. For BJP, UP is supremely important because it makes all the difference between just being a leader of NDA and being in power all by itself, with allies merely adding to the optics. So, it is no surprise that the 2024 national election will be substantially decided by who wins UP in 2022, and how decisively. In many ways, UP is the ultimate ‘double-engine sarkar’ that BJP likes talking about. And this is more than just the Centre and state working together in harmony for the state’s development. For the first time since BJP became a major player in state politics in the 1990s, it has two popular leaders deeply invested in it — Narendra Modi, the MP from Varanasi, and Yogi Adityanath, former Gorakhpur MP and chief minister in Lucknow.And between 2014 and 2017, when BJP won big in the state assembly polls, its political base had been twin-engined: Mandal yoked to Mandir. Before 2014, BJP was largely driven by the upper castes and the appeal of the Ram Mandir, which has now been resolved by the courts. The party has since stitched together a coalition of the non-Yadav castes to create a Mandalite base even while eroding Mayawati’s dalit base. There is no better way to describe this twin-engine growth than ‘subaltern Hindutva’.The problem for BJP lies not with the twin engines, but with the reality that both have to pull together with extraordinary coordination when the target voter population for the party is just under 75%, excluding Muslims and Yadavs. The issues are internal as much as about communicating the party’s voter strategy effectively.The elevation of Adityanath from aprovincial Hindutva figure to chief ministership has created a new national icon for BJP’s core base, causing disquiet among both traditional BJP leaders and even the Sangh. Unlike Modi, who emerged from the innards of Sangh ideology, Adityanath is saffron in a non-Sanghi way. This is why we heard murmurs of him being replaced a month or two ago. But the party leadership knows that Adityanath is now too big a brand to be sidelined without causing a lot of internal haemorrhage.Hauled Over the CoalitionSo, while twin-engine it is in terms of leadership, it will be an uneasy alliance between the diehard Moditva brigade and the emerging Adityanath enthusiasts.There is some concern about the political alignments, too. Unlike 2017, when Samajwadi Party (SP) teamed up with Congress and Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) fought alone, this time the alignments could be different. Mayawati has lost some of her political clout with the emergence of more radical dalit voices like Bhim Army, and so the real fight will be between the SP-led coalition of parties, backed strongly by a consolidated minority vote, and BJP.While Asaduddin Owaisi of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) hopes to draw some of the Muslim vote towards his minoritarian party, he may not make much of an impact this time. As we saw in West Bengal, when it comes to keeping BJP out, Muslims tend to vote tactically with the party that seems best placed to defeat or emasculate it. This could happen in UP, too, this time.In short, unlike 2017, when it had several factors working for it, including a promised farm loan waiver and a split minority vote, this time BJP’s task is tougher.It is in this context that two recent events must be seen. One relates to the UP government’s announcement on July 17 that it has cancelled this year’s kanwar yatra, where millions of young people participate in an annual pilgrimage, and which Adityanath saw as important to emphasise his Hindutva credentials. Under pressure from the Supreme Court, which saw the yatra as a potential Covid-19 super-spreader event, the CM has had to back down.Another niggling irritant has been the questions raised about a land purchase deal in Ayodhya by the Mandir trust. Opponents want to raise a stink for obvious reasons: they would like to dent any potential political benefit for BJP from the temple’s construction by alleging that murky deals are besmirching the fair name of Lord Ram.Caught in a TrapezoidHowever, neither issue is likely to play much of a role in deciding who wins 2022 because Adityanath can claim that he was fully behind the yatra, and it was the ‘enemies of Hindutva’ who used the courts to halt it. BJP can also turn the accusations surrounding the land deal into a conspiracy planned by anti-Hindu forces to halt the construction of the temple. The opposition’s efforts may well boomerang on it, for the average Hindu voter may not to be swayed by mere allegations of hankypanky. BJP is unlikely to trip on these issues.In essence, the temple could become the binding force for BJP as the party cadre knows that if it loses the 2022 assembly elections, the opposition may do everything to delay the temple’s construction by 2024. So, while 2022 looks tougher than 2017, if BJP’s twin engine pulls together, one has to bet in its favour.
from Economic Times https://ift.tt/3BiNAu2
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