Election fever yet to grip Agra, Mathura voters

MANDATE 2004

In Makhdoom village, just off the Agra-Mathura Highway, the fact that a general election is on is India's best kept secret. There are no blaring loudspeakers here, no buntings, no flags.

In this area dominated by Jats, Dalits, Jatavs and Muslims, days are flying by in a blur - the sudden surge in temperatures has caused the crop to mature early requiring harvesting a few days ahead of time. Threshing and harvesting is at its peak. The time to gossip is in the mandis, not in the fields.

The only hint you get of elections (due in Agra and Mathura on May 5) is from the Prime Minister's hoardings celebrating the Golden Quadrilateral, which have been covered with muslin in accordance with the Election Commission's directive.

"I have not voted for years. Others vote on our behalf. We never get to cast our vote," said a wage cropper with cheerful insouciance at Farrah village.

The general impression, however, is that this time, Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) is out of the picture. The straight fight in this part of the state - on the edge of the region loosely called western UP - is between the Samajwadi Party and the BJP. No one bothers to mention the Congress.

This is a revelation. In the 1999 election, in Agra, the BSP came third after the SP and the BJP. Its candidate got 18 per cent of the vote. It is the BJP candidate who is ruing the fact that no alliance could be struck with the BSP, which could have resulted in the SP's defeat.

Agra, where the SP has fielded film actor and sitting MP, Raj Babbar, is trying harder at an election. Here, there are flags and buntings and Mulayam Singh Yadav definitely has the upper hand. This is not surprising.

Although in neighbouring Mathura, the BJP has fielded sitting MP Tejvir Singh who is hopeful of garnering Jat votes, in Agra, the defeated BJP candidate in 1999, BS Rawat has been replaced by Murarilal Mittal Fatehpuria, a businessman. This is unlikely to improve the BJP's chances.

The area is known for caste solidarity. Both Jats and Jatavs, intensely feudal, tend to mimic each other's social behaviour. Cases of hanging and burning alive couples who have eloped together because they belong to different castes, are legion here. Families are made to witness these incidents and mothers are known to endorse it.

In this cruel and inflexible countryside, election fever will take some time permeating. However, in this general election, voting tradition is likely to triumph over waves - so the area could be evenly divided between the SP and the BJP.