By Arun Srivastava
Ever
since the 2017 UP assembly election, BJP has been trying to counter Ambedkar’s
influence by projecting some lesser known dalit leaders and trying to exploit
the differences amongst dalit sub castes.
The
party probably feels that playing up the sub caste icons will help it win over
the trust of these classes. Incidentally in the last couple of years new groups
of dalit leaders, especially youths, have emerged on the political horizon.
They firmly believe in Ambedkar’s political line, but at the same time they are
against any attempt to bifurcate the sub groups and pitch them against each
other. In a shrewd move the BJP has been projecting the new dalit and backward
icons chosen by it as pro Hindu.
This
strategy paid it handsomely in the 2017 assembly elections. Before the election
party president Amit Shah had unveiled the statue of dalit leader Raja
Suheldev. The dalits deserted Mayawati and voted for the BJP. But the emergence
of organizations like Bhim Army, founded by lawyer Chandrashekhar Azad Ravan
and Vinay Ratan Singh, has altered the dynamics of the dalit politics. Bhim
Army is working for dalit emancipation through education. It runs 350 free
schools for dalits in western Uttar Pradesh: Saharanpur, Meerut, Shamli and
Muzaffarnagar.
As
Mayawati could not challenge the hegemony of the upper castes, the Bhim Army
took upon itself to protect the dignity of the dalits. It became prominent in
the wake of caste clashes in Uttar Pradesh. Ravan was subsequently arrested by
the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force.
The
leadership has been soft towards the Congress but with Priyanka Gandhi jumping
into the fray, they expecting a meaningful role by her. This will put the BJP
in an awkward position. Even Mayawati will feel the heat. In view of the
changing political scenario it is expected that a fairly good portion of dalits
would rally behind Congress. The resolve of the Bhim Army is to defeat the BJP.
Azad
says: “We believe in the constitution of this country but we were branded as
Naxals because we opposed the picking up innocent young people and arbitrary
police raids. We have received threats. We were told that if the society is
yours, the government is ours, where will you run away? It is our contribution
to the country which has resulted in this support”. Azad was named as an accused
in as many as 24 FIRs by the state police for his alleged role in fanning
violent protests by members of the dalit community in the district. The UP
Congress had extended full support to Azad.
During
this short period Bhim Army has emerged as a formidable political force. It
even has a strong base in Maharashtra. Dalits form around 14% of Maharashtra’s
population with Buddhist Dalits (erstwhile Mahars who converted to Buddhism)
comprising a majority.
Until
the rise of the BSP under Kanshi Ram, dalits in Uttar Pradesh had voted for the
Congress, and a significant part of the community had stuck with the party all
the way up to the 2014 election, a study by the CSDS revealed. A cursory look
at the seats lost by the Congress in the 2014 Lok Sabha election reveals that
it has bagged sizeable proportion of votes. Congress would have put a good
fight if the dalit votes had not got fragmented. The primary reason for
fragmentation in dalit votes has been the division along the lines of jati or
sub-caste within the dalit caste group. But this time the young dalit leaders
are striving to ensure that their votes do not get divided.
The
Congress is seeking to revive its old traditional support base of dalits plus
upper castes. One thing is absolutely clear that 2019 will witness the
emergence of a new dalit politics in Uttar Pradesh, where the upper castes
would be forced to play the second fiddle. A bigger question is whether this
new phase of dalit politics would bring an end to the discrimination dalits still
face in getting political representation at various levels of government.
While
the BJP is battling with Congress and the Bahujan Samaj Party for dalit votes
in UP and the rest of the Hindi heartland, with Priyanka on scene it has to
evolve a new mechanism to win over them. BJP’s state unit is holding a series
of meetings to placate angry dalits who voted overwhelmingly for Modi in 2014
and then Yogi in 2017. Both the BJP and Congress are aggressively eyeing
dalits.
The
Congress, meanwhile, is striving to create a ‘yuva dalit leadership’. Though it
has been working to correct its image among dalits and ‘clearing misgivings’
about Ambedkar’s relation with the party, the prime task before the party would
be to ensure better representation to dalits in the party. On its part the BJP
too is taking all pains to keep its hold on dalit voters. Modi has already
directed leaders to interact with dalits. Congress is also trying to provide a
new character to its dalit policy. (IPA
Service)
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