Not far from the epicentre of the Muzaffarnagar riots in which 62 people were killed and more than 50,000 displaced from their homes, the sleepy Jat village of Kawal is seeing the political fault lines change.
In 2013, the riots were sparked between Jats and Muslims after three young men were killed in a village two kilometres away, and voters here closed ranks behind the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections that followed. Their anger against the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh and the Congress at the Centre, for allegedly “favouring” Muslims, had made them vote en masse for the BJP, helping the party win 71 of the 80 seats in the State.
After the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP has managed to consolidate itself in the riot-affected district where it had failed to win a seat in the 2012 Assembly elections. But following the riots, the saffron party not only wrested the Muzaffarnagar City Assembly seat from the Samajwadi Party in the bypolls but also won all the elections that took place after that, including gram panchayat and zila panchayat elections.
This time, however, it’s not going to be easy for the BJP. “We won the 2014 elections in a big way thanks to the Jat support. But this time it looks a bit tricky because of ticket being given to outsiders, such as [former Congress MP] Avtar Singh Bhadana of the Gujjar community from the Mirapur seat,” says Virendar Baliyan, a BJP worker. He said Sanjeev Baliyan, BJP MP, had promised to ensure that the BJP ticket from Mirapur would go to a Jat, because after the riots the seat had become a matter of prestige for the community.
“Given the Jat anger against the BJP and also the anger of local workers against Mr. Bhadana, there is no way he will win,” says another BJP member who did not want to be named. A majority of Jats in the Mirapur constituency said they would rather vote for a fellow Jat like Mithilesh Pal, who is the RLD candidate.
The BJP, however, retains its popularity in many pockets of Muzaffarnagar, particularly the urban parts.
Vikas Baliyan, a lawyer and also a farmer activist, said: “The educated Jats in the Muzaffarnagar city seat may not want to waste their votes by supporting an RLD candidate. They would still go with the BJP.”
He does, however, underline that the BJP is further saddled with two other problems — the long-standing demand for Jat reservations and the demonetisation drive.
