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Ahead of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress party’s woes appear to be serious. To be sure, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is hardly in a good place for a third-term at the Centre as the ruling party is now mired in the lowest point, at least in terms of public opinion. Pre-election surveys predicted that the party would lose a large number of seats even in states where the Congress did well in the 2009 parliamentary elections.
"The Congress’s alliance negotiations with Mayawati have reached an advanced stage …,” reported The Telegraph last week, adding a tie-up with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Uttar Pradesh will mark a reversal of Rahul Gandhi’s strategy to revive the Congress in the country’s most populous state that accounts for 80 Lok Sabha seats.
Reacting to the remote possibility of a pact between the Congress and the BSP, Union Minister for Steel and senior Congress leader Beni Prasad has said that the party would alone win 50 out of 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state.
Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s unscheduled visit to the camps of riot victims in Muzaffarnagar, two weeks after his party’s drubbing in the recent Assembly polls, is seen as a calculated move to woo the traditional support bases of the party. Congress leaders believe a large section of the Muslim community to shift towards the party reacting to BJP projecting Narendra Modi its prime ministerial candidate. Congress chief Sonia Gandhi met a Jat delegation demanding reservation. It is believed to be a fine balancing act as the Jats were pitted against the Muslims in the Muzaffarnagar riots.
As The Telegraph noted, Mayawati too was serious about an alliance with the Congress and that what was holding back a final agreement was a tussle over how many seats each would contest. Mayawati, however, understands the symbolic importance of a tie-up with the Congress in terms of Muslim votes, which will be a key factor in the polarisation wrought by Narendra Modi.
“The BSP has a strong support base and its core vote bank appears to be intact in the state. The Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party government awfully erred in several fronts. Also, the pathetic performance of Samajwadi government during Muzaffarnargar violence came as a blessing in disguise for Mayawati as she has emerged as a clear-cut non-BJP force in the state. Anything could happen between now and next April-May, though,” said Dwivedi.
There is one school of thought that argues that the Muslim vote bank to an extent is gravitating towards Congress in the state and the party’s game plan is to build the social coalition of Muslims and Dalits. Experts say a united Jat-Dalit-Muslim vote-bloc likely to favour the BSP–Congress if it takes shape before 2014 elections, especially in the western UP, with a strong Muslim presence.
“It seems that Dalits are less enthusiastic for voting in favour of the BSP this time in forthcoming parliamentary polls as they are well aware that Mayawati is not at all a serious contender for power at the Centre. The Congress has a huge chance to make inroads into Dalit vote bank as well. Also, Mayawati’s strategy would be to liquidate her arch rival Mulayam Singh Yadav to a single digit number and turn the entire Lok Sabha contest into Congress versus BJP battle in the state, argues A K Verma professor at Kanpur Christ Church College.
Caste and community have not ceased to matter in UP politics. Political parties in the state today are the ones that become the stronghold of one caste or community. The Muslims, which accounts for approximately 20% of UP’s population, seem to a divided house in the state. “Mulayam Singh, (once labelled “Maulana Mulayam” for his closeness to Muslims), will likely to lose the minority community’s support in 2014 as the SP government’s laidback attitude during riots created a poor image of the state administration in the eyes of Muslims. In this changed political scenario, they may prefer Congress to Samajwadi to a large extent. Muslims, by and large, have voted for non-BJP parties, or anti-BJP parties in states where BJP has been an important player. However, there is also a possibility that a section of politically aware Muslims might vote for Modi (BJP) as the Gujarat Chief Minister has emerged as an efficient and incorruptible administrator, said Verma.
With the general polls nearly three months away, Gandhi, 43, is trying to reach out to the community, whose disillusionment with the Samajwadi and support to the Congress in the 2009 parliamentary elections helped it win 21 seats from UP. The Congress too understands the importance of the heartland in national politics.
