Post the failure of SP-BSP alliance in the 2019 general election, BSP Supremo Mayawati has decided to contest future elections without forming an alliance with any party. According to her, SP votes weren’t transferred to her party. On the other hand, SP leaders claim that BSP was benefited due to the alliance, whereas SP couldn’t increase its tally of 2014. BSP got 10 seats in 2019 Lok Sabha election compared to zero during 2014, whereas SP just got five seats the same as 2014. However, the bottom line is, the SP-BSP alliance was itself incompatible due to the socially contradictory vote banks. Such alliances can’t add their vote banks arithmetically. To understand U.P. polity post the Mandal agitation and Babri demolition, we need to look into the caste equation of the state.
The exact caste/community wise census is not available for U.P., although, there are various surveys, which are almost the same with some variations. For example, as per the ‘Demography Wikipedia,’ the every section’s population is as below:
Samajwadi Party was formed in 1992 as a breakaway party from Janata Dal/Janata Party. Janata Dal, too, post Mandal agitation, became a party with OBC vote bank. However, in the 1993 assembly election, this party got just 17.94% vote share. On the other hand, BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party), which was formed in 1984, also took part in the 1989 U.P. assembly election. The party was made purely for Dalit representation, who are 20% of the U.P. population. In 1991 assembly election, it got 19.64% vote share.
In 1993 assembly, BSP allied with SP, still, it got 19.64%, whereas SP got 17.94% votes. The general idea was that SP got Yadav votes fully along with some Muslim votes too. On the other hand, BSP got the Dalit votes in toto. Dalit votes were earlier exclusively with Congress and were against the non-Congress parties. SP got only a part of the OBC votes as Janata Dal and Janata party were still active in the state, due to which the OBC votes got divided. BJP got 33.3% vote share from the upper castes along with some OBC votes, especially from those living in the urban areas in the name of ‘Ram temple’. The Muslim votes were divided between SP and Congress.
In 1995, due to the infamous guest-house assault against Mayawati by SP workers, BSP withdrew its support from the Mulayam Singh government, and Mayawati became the Chief Minister with BJP’s support. In the 1996 assembly election, again there was a hung house, where BJP got 32.52% vote share, SP-led coalition got 21.80% vote share while BSP maintained its 19.64% vote share. From 1996 to 2002 Mayawati, Kalyan Singh, Ram Prakash Gupta and Rajnath Singh were CM of the state through post-poll alliance arrangements.
In the 2002 assembly election, BJP’s vote share went down to 20.08%, SP’s vote share increased to 25.37%, BSP’s vote share, too, increased to 23.06%. The Congress’ vote share reduced to 8.96%. What happened here? BJP conceded its OBC votes to SP and the Congress conceded its Muslim votes to BSP. Point to be noted here is that the OBC votes never go to BSP and the Dalit votes never go to SP. That’s the caste reality there.
It must be realised that the caste equation in U.P. is such that any caste/religion combination does not work her. For example, MY (Muslim-Yadav) combination isn’t benefiting, because in western U.P., Muslims are in large number, but Yadavs are very few. On the other hand, in eastern U.P., Yadavs are dominant in number, but Muslims are less significant. This also applies to DM (Dalit-Muslim) combination as they combinedly couldn’t yield more seats either.
In 2007, for the first time, Mayawati connected with the upper caste population doing away with her constant hate speech against them. Because of that, she lost Muslim votes (upper castes are for Ram temple), but still, she was able to win 206 seats in 2007 assembly election with 30.43% vote share. Here, in fact, the Dalit and upper caste vote combination worked. SP maintained its 25.43% vote share, while BJP got a reduced vote share of 16.97%. Mayawati became the CM of U.P. from 2007 to 2012 with the help of some independents.
By this time the upper caste vote became a trump card. Thus, SP lured the upper caste community by accommodating some good leaders. Thus, in the 2012 assembly election, it got a vote share of 29.15%, whereas BSP was reduced to 25.91%. This time, BSP was able to get the Muslim votes, but it lost the upper caste votes, whereas SP retained some Muslim votes and got around 5–6% of the upper caste votes. Some Muslim votes went to INC from SP, which increased its vote share up to 11.63%, whereas BJP’s vote share was further reduced to 15%. SP got 224 seats, and Akhilesh Yadav remained as the CM from 2012 to 2017. (Upper caste and Muslim votes are also rivals post the Babri masjid demolition due to which they can’t combinedly support a party or alliance.) UP polity is very complex due to such rivalry/enmity between castes and communities.
Now the question is: what happened in the 2014 general election? Let me share the vote share in U.P. in 2014 general election. BJP got 42.3% vote share, SP got 22.20%, and BSP got 19.6%. What happened exactly? Non-Jatav OBC votes went from BSP to BJP. Similarly, non-Yadav OBC votes from SP to BJP and upper-class votes returned to BJP. Before answering why, let me also share 2017 assembly vote share. BJP got 39.7% vote share, SP got 22% and BSP got 22.2%. Let’s also see the 2019 vote share. In the 2019 general election, BJP got 49.56% vote share, SP got 17.96% and BSP got 19.26%.
From the 2014 general election, non-Jatav Dalits left BSP. The reason is simple. Mayawati is from the Jatav Community. Thus, during her tenure as CM, Jatav community dominated every part of the government and non-Jatav Dalit community felt ignored and sidelined. They couldn’t go to SP, and because Congress had no muscle in the state, the only alternative was to go to BJP. Thus, when Amit Shah accommodated some non-Jatav leaders, they rallied behind BJP.
Similarly, during Akhilesh Yadav’s rule or even before, Yadav community, which comprises just 8% of the population became dominant in all parts of the government. This alienated many non-Yadav OBC communities from SP. They, too, couldn’t go to BSP because of the rivalry, ans since the Congress had no muscle, they supported BJP. The same thing happened in 2017. As a result, in 2019, more non-Yadav OBCs and non-Jatav Dalits supported BJP.
The point must be understood that Yadavs and Dalits can’t align themselves because of the long-standing rivalry/enmity owing to the caste politic in U.P. During the SP rule Dalits were harassed and during the BSP rule Yadavs and other OBCs were harassed. Such harassment is very much prevalent in the rural belts and UP has more than 80% of its population residing in rural areas. That’s why when SP-BSP formed an alliance, the vote transfer became totally impossible. Now if we add the 9% Jatavs,19% Muslims and 8% Yadavs votes, we will get 36% vote share, whereas SP and BSP’s combined vote share in 2019 was (17.96+19.26) 37.22%. Isn’t the math interesting?
What should SP and BSP do now? SP needs to regain its non-Yadav OBC votes. For this, it needs to stop making SP a family party. In 2014, all five members of SP were from the Mulayam Singh’s family. In 2019, too, it’s not very different. If SP doesn’t rectify its core base, it can’t succeed in future. With just 8% Yadav votes and 19% Muslim votes you can’t win an election. I think at this juncture, Muslims have also started thinking about rallying behind the Congress. Some Muslims are also looking at BJP as their well-wisher (although their number is less than 5% of the Muslim community).
BSP leader Mayawati needs to bring back the non-Jatav community to her party fold. However, the way she has given the plumb posts of the party to his brother and nephew, I don’t think she has any intent of rectifying her party. Being a high stature Dalit leader doesn’t make Dalits follow you blindly anymore. In this information technology era, every person irrespective of their caste, religion, financial condition etc. has become more aware politically and can see through whatever design the political parties make.
One more point needs to be noted here. The caste competition is so high it would be difficult to keep non-Jatav Dalits and non-Yadav OBCs into the BJP’s fold for a long time as you can’t satisfy all. Therefore, when these people leave BJP, then they might opt for Congress. Thus, SP and BSP should be careful, because their space can be taken over (or regained) by the Congress especially if the BJP does something horribly wrong in the 2022 assembly election. But yes, SP-BSP alliance is incompatible, and SP and BSP both are losing their core vote bank ever since the 2014 elections.