Votes began registering into EVMs on Thursday in the first of the seven-phase assembly election in Uttar Pradesh – in what would also signal the start of mood-evolution for the 2024 General Elections. India’s largest state in terms of population size of 20 crore, Uttar Pradesh with its sweep of 80 Lok Sabha seats would principally decide who should rule India after every general election. Assembly results are unpredictable. What’s predictable is that the ruling BJP is facing a stiff fight from the Samajwadi Party – Rashtriya Lok Dal alliance, with anti-incumbency factor subtly at work. Notably, the BJP could not introduce new dynamics to effectively counter this trend. The Election Commission diktat against holding of huge rallies and street shows, in view of the Covid spread, has a positive effect on the campaign scene. It reduced the money power, the bane of every election and principal excuse for corruption by politicians.
Predictably, attempts are on from the BJP for a polarization of Hindu votes in the face of a likely consolidation of BC and Muslim support in favour of the SP-led alliance. To this is the additional heft being provided to the alliance by farmers, largely the Jats, under the banner of the RLD. The western UP areas where the first phase polling was held for 58 seats was where the agitation against the farm reforms was massive. The BJP is seeking to counter this huge consolidation with a slogan of Hindu unity against the “machinations of Pakistan” that chief minister Yogi Adityanath raised on Thursday. The stray firing on AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi after his meeting in Meerut was perhaps part of an attempt at accentuating religious polarization to reap a harvest of votes and seats for the BJP. The time-tested RSS attempt to use (Ram) Mandir to neutralize the Mandal (BC consolidation) effect is seeing a replay now.
Prime Minister Modi does not attach much importance to the SP-RLD alliance and has dismissed it as a play of “two boys” (Akhilesh Yadav and Jayant Chaudhary, both dynasts). What would be on test would be how powerful the aura of Modi and Yogi would be to counter the charge by Akhilesh. The Congress bandwagon led by Priyanka Gandhi has not made much headway. It does not have a strong organisational structure in UP to effectively take on the titans while the voice of old warhorse Mayawati with her strong Dalit support in the past appears to have been lost in the din raised by the SP and BJP.