On a chilly Saturday evening, about 60 km from the national capital, around 20 people have gathered in a small, newly plastered house at Ronakpura, a Valmiki settlement of Meerut.
The agenda of the meeting, Prem Nath Dhingra, a Valmiki leader says, is to defeat Laxmikant Bajpai, the BJP candidate from the Meerut City constituency. Mr. Bajpai, former chief of the BJP’s Uttar Pradesh unit and three-time MLA of the constituency, faces the wrath of the Dalit community for “ignoring their concerns”.
The Valmiki community, which “generally behaves like a BJP vote bank, has decided to create history”, says Mr. Dhingra, and “vote for BSP this time”
Standing next to an open sewage drain with the all-pervasive stench of an overflowing garbage dump, Ronakpura is inhabited by sanitation workers. Mr. Dhingra says, “Look at our living conditions. This has happened after we supported a party which is ruling the Meerut civic body for the past 15 years, and espouses the cause of Swachh Bharat while relegating us to garbage dumps.”
Traders miffed
But Valmikis are not the only community which seem to have turned against the BJP this time, says Bhupendra Chaudhary, the owner of the “Janta book stall” at the Meerut-Delhi bus stand.
According to Mr. Chaudhary, following demonetisation, the community of small and medium traders in Meerut — the financial capital of western Uttar Pradesh, which traditionally used to stand with the BJP — has now decided to switch preferences. Members of Chaudhary’s caste — Punjabi-Khatri — have a clear alternative in Pankaj Jolly, a Sikh businessman, of the BSP.
Discussions with many shopkeepers and customers in the central market in Shahrti Nagar and Subhash Bazaar and other upmarket areas such as Abu Lane, reveal a wave of support for Akhilesh Yadav as a “development man”. But many were quick to tell The Hindu that “caste arithmetic” did not support the Samajwadi Party in several seats in western U.P. For his part, Mr. Chaudhary declares that it is “advantage BSP this time in western U.P.”
Crucial Jat vote
One prominent reason is Jat anger against the BJP. The community is coalescing around the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD). “Jats are not voting for the Congress or the SP. Our support is first for RLD and if not RLD, then for BSP,” asserts Vijendar Singh of Jagriti Vihar in Meerut. Mr. Singh, a farmer, has been a staunch loyalist of Chaudhary Charan Singh, but had switched to the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
Satish Prakash, a Dalit intellectual and faculty at the historic Meerut College, said Jat support for the RLD will only strengthen the BSP. “The BSP stands to gain even if Jats do not vote for it because, by supporting the RLD, they are cutting into the BJP’s Jat vote bank,” he says.
Thanks to this “Advantage BSP” moment, party candidate in Kithor constituency, Gajraj Singh Nagar — a seasoned Gujjar politician — is expected to give Shahid Manzoor, the Labour Minister in Akhilesh Yadav’s Cabinet, a run for his money. While Mr. Nagar expects the votes of Jatavs and Gujjars, another old-time local politician and the RLD candidate, Matloob Gaur, is expected to cut into the Muslim votes and weaken Mr. Manzoor’s prospects.
In Meerut South, won by the BJP in 2012, the BSP’s Yaqoob Quraishi is taking on the BJP’s Somendar Tomar. Locals say that while the Congress’s Azad Saifi is a weak candidate who will make significant inroads into the Muslim votes, the RLD’s Pappu Gujjar will cut into both Gujjar and Jat votes and weaken the BJP’s prospects.
Raman Tyagi from Neer Foundation says: “Meerut has been one of the BJP bastions in western U.P. where it won four out of seven seats in 2012. But now its winning prospect is so shaky only because of the BSP that the State unit had to push for Narendra Modi’s first rally of the State [to be held] in Meerut.”
While most of the people The Hindu interviewed were not so optimistic about the BJP’s chances, Rahul Sharma, who teaches Management at Chaudhary Charan Singh University, said the party’s prospects would improve after Mr. Modi’s rally in Meerut on February 4.
