The duo of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh (UP) Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has trumped the formidable ‘mahagathbandhan’ of regional heavyweights Samajwadi Party (SP) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in the polls.
With counting still on at the time of filing this report, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had already won 28 parliamentary seats and was leading in 34 other constituencies across UP, the state which elects the maximum (80) members to parliament.
In one of the biggest upsets of the election, Congress President Rahul Gandhi was staring at defeat in the family’s stronghold of Amethi, trailing the BJP’s Smriti Irani by nearly 25,000 votes. In the 2014 election, he had defeated Irani by a narrow margin of little more than 100,000 votes.
Those in the BJP who, at the time of going to press, had already won, included Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh (Lucknow) who defeated SP candidate Poonam Sinha, the wife of BJP turncoat Shatrughan Sinha who is himself a Congress candidate from Patna Sahib. Union Minister General (Ret) V K Singh had won from Ghaziabad.
Meanwhile, the ‘mahagathbandhan’ had either won or was leading in 17 other seats. Under the grand alliance, the SP and BSP contested 37 and 38 seats respectively, while leaving two seats for the Rashtriya Lok Dal and three for the Congress. Among the grand alliance constituents, the BSP was leading in more seats (10) than the SP (7).
The critical takeaway of the UP results is the indication of a tactical shift in the voting pattern away from caste and community considerations. The ‘mahagathbandhan’ was aimed at consolidating backward, Muslim and Dalit votes to create a winning axis against the BJP.
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In contrast, the BJP focused on Modi, nationalism and the ‘sabka saath, sabka vikas’ mantra of taking all communities together without special consideration towards a particular caste or section of society. This appeared to have delivered the goods for the party.
The Congress fielded candidates in nearly 70 seats but was leading only in one constituency at Rae Bareli where United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi was in the fray.
It seems the Congress’ game plan to galvanise its cadres by deploying Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and former union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to manage the campaign backfired and failed to create any chemistry with voters. The comatose party structure in the state did the rest.
The recent exit polls also predicted a BJP sweep although a couple of pollsters also forecast the consolidation of votes by the ‘mahagathanbhan’ in UP which had elected 73 members for the National Democratic Alliance in 2014.
Meanwhile, the election in the state has sprung other surprises, perhaps too many, for the Congress and its alliance partners. For example, Akshay Yadav, the son of SP general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, was trailing in Firozabad against the BJP’s Chandra Sen Jadaon.
In Badaun, SP president Akhilesh Yadav’s cousin, Dharmendra Yadav, was trailing BJP nominee Sanghmitra Maurya, the daughter of UP minister and BSP turncoat Swami Prasad Maurya.
Similarly, UP Congress president Raj Babbar was trailing in Fatehpur Sikri while party veteran and former union minister Salman Khurshid lost from Farrukhabad.
The SP had some shocks too. SP President Akhilesh Yadav’s wife Dimple was trailing by nearly 20,000 votes in Kannuaj behind the BJP’s Subrat Pathak. Its one consolation was that Yadav was leading in Azamgarh by more than 100,000 votes. Yadav’s father and SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav was also leading in his pocket borough of Mainpuri.
Bhojpuri cinema star and BJP candidate Ravi Kishan was heading towards a big victory in Gorakhpur, the turf of chief minister Yogi Adityanath.
Meanwhile, the virtual rout of the ‘mahagathbandhan’ in UP is likely to spur a rethink by the SP and BSP. Although the two had reiterated their commitment towards working together for the coming 2022 UP elections, the unexpected result is likely to make them re-strategise.
Meanwhile, the BJP won all the five constituencies in the hill state of Uttarakhand. The victorious candidates included Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank from Haridwar. Former chief minister and Congress leader Harish Rawat lost to the BJP’s Ajay Bhatt in Nainital.