In continuation with our efforts to decode the factors that are going to play a crucial role in Uttar Pradesh Assembly Elections 2022, we are back with the second part of the series. In this part, we are going to talk about the polarization that took place in the state elections last time on religious lines. Once the center stage of polarization due to the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, UP politics became saturated for BJP for almost two decades. However, the result of the last assembly elections proved that polarization of Hindu voters can bring unprecedented results.
No political pundit can deny the fact that after 1991, 2017 was the first UP assembly elections that was fought on religious sentiments due to the then SP-led incumbent government’s Muslim appeasement. Hindu voters voted unanimously for BJP. Will this repeat in UP assembly elections 2022?
In our first part, we tried to capture how one section of Hindu community thought that it was being sidelined from state politics. Will Brahmins of the state give vote to an anti-BJP party? It is quite an unlikely scenario given that Brahmins have a history of voting either Congress or BJP in the state. It’s also true that BSP Supremo Mayawati tried to lure Brahmin voters, however, most of the Brahmin voters stayed aloof from BSP and kept voting either BJP or Congress but SP.
Congress is nowhere near to contest a healthy competition to BJP, that means Brahmin voters won’t like to waste their votes by voting Congress. Talking about BSP, it looks completely insipid this time and on a couple of occasions, BSP Supremo has given indications that she is ready to join hands with BJP to keep SP out of the power. This implies that even if Brahmins voted to BSP, it will ultimately go to BJP. This will be a huge sigh of relief for BJP given the dissatisfaction that Brahmins have reported.
What about Dalit communities? As stated earlier, BSP has already indicated that it is ready to form a coalition with BJP. In case, Dalit community decides to go with its three-decades favorite party BSP, it won’t harm BJP much as we can see vote transfer taking place in the coalition government.
Coming to Yadav voters, it’s going to be interesting this time if the 15% voters will vote for the incumbent government or SP. Just like previous assembly elections, they can surprise the political pundits. One of the interesting things about the last elections was BJP’s capability to woo the OBC communities. Most of the OBC communities have been voting for BSP for years, 2017 was an aberration. Similar to the last elections, it is quite likely that they would show their confidence in the Yogi government. Ever since the debacle of 2019 general elections, Mayawati hasn’t made much public appearances in the state and looks like she has accepted her fate.
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