After the dismal assembly election outing, the party’s increased voteshare in Azamgarh gives it fresh hope
The recent Lok Sabha bypolls in Azamgarh and Rampur served some harsh lessons to the Samajwadi Party, the principal opposition party in Uttar Pradesh as it lost both its bastions. But it does give new hope to the other prominent opposition party in UP, the Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party.
The BSP did not contest the Rampur seat but in Azamgarh party candidate Shah Alam aka Guddu Jamali polled more than 29% of the votes, indicating that the party has not lost its relevance after the abysmal show in the assembly polls. Jamali finished third, after the BJP and SP, in the three-cornered fight in Azamgarh.
BSP functionaries claim the bypolls results bring new hope of a revival for the party in the state. A senior functionary says, ‘The kind of response the BSP got in Azamgarh, where the SP won 10 out of 10 seats in Assembly polls this year, is huge. We played a big part in stopping the SP in the bypolls and a major thing for us is that the minority Muslims voted for us. So in the future, if the Muslims and Dalits vote for us and we get the support of one more caste (either Brahmin or any non-Yadav OBC caste), the combination will win us many seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. We have to keep working hard to create a narrative that we are the only option against the BJP, that the SP does not have the capacity to fight the saffron party.
After the Lok Sabha bypolls results, Mayawati called upon the Muslim community to support the BSP in future elections, saying only her party had the strength to defeat the BJP. The BSP supremo is also likely to give important positions to Muslim leaders in the party organisation soon; several minority community leaders might also return to the party fold, say sources.
The results of the bypolls have also strengthened speculation of cracks in the Muslim votebank–considered traditional voters of the SP. Muslim voters might have voted unanimously in favour of the SP during the 2022 state assembly election, but voices of dissent are rising as SP continuously loses to the BJP.
Prof. Kavi Raj, UP-based political analyst and faculty at Lucknow University, says, ”The BSP still has the potential to make a comeback but only if they work hard on the ground and are able to create a narrative that they are stronger than the SP. For this, they must reach out to the common people and change their working style. For this, Mayawati herself has to come out and campaign. They also have to get veteran non-Yadav OBC and Dalit leaders back in the party.” In the 2022 UP assembly election, the BSP managed just 12.9 per cent of the total vote, the party’s worst performance in the last 25 years. The party has just one MLA in the 403-seat house.
Mayawati now wants party workers to get fully involved in increasing their numbers. A BSP functionary told that zonal in-charges and district presidents have been given targets–increase party membership by one lakh each. The party is also trying to get back some of its old leaders, especially from the Dalit and Muslim community. It seems the party focus will now be on seats where Dalits and Muslims make up more than 30% of the total votes.
