LUCKNOW: Working on Dalit-Muslim-Upper caste equations to sail through in the ensuing elections, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has been distributing the party tickets cautiously. However, the party has fielded many unknown faces probably due to the paucity of candidates this time after suffering from an exodus of potential leaders.
The biggest challenge which the BSP faces in the present elections is to save its prestige on, at least, those 10 seats which it had won while contesting in alliance with SP and RLD in 2019.
The allies of 2019 are now fighting as foes and the BSP, which is going alone in UP, seems to be targeting SP more than the BJP. Significantly, both the SP and the BSP have had a historical background of poaching each other’s premises of voters, whether it is Muslims who are generally known to be favouring the SP or the OBCs, or even the SCs.
Keeping all these factors in mind, the BSP chief has fielded Mohammad Sarwar Malik against defence minister and senior BJP leader Rajnath Singh from the Lucknow Lok Sabha Seat. Undoubtedly, the presence of the BSP candidate will drive division in Muslim votes thus making the path of Rajnath Singh easier than Ravi Das Mehrotra of SP. Rajnath Singh is seeking a third term from Lucknow after 2014 and 2019. In 2009, he contested from Ghaziabad and had won the seat.
Similarly, in another tactical move seemingly directed at the Samajwadi Party, Mayawati has given the ticket to OBC Gulshan Dev Shakya against Dimple Yadav in Mainpuri.
In Mainpuri, the BSP’s ploy of fielding Shakya appears to be aimed at denting the SP’s OBC support base. The BJP is yet to declare its candidate for Mainpuri, an SP pocket borough, going to polls in the third phase on May 7.
Besides, another Muslim candidate Imran Bin Zafar is BSP's candidate in Kannauj, where a member of Akhilesh Yadav’s family is likely to contest. BJP has repeated its MP Subrat Pathak in Kannauj.
As per the buzz, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, who was planning to contest from Kannauj, may not fight the Lok Sabha elections at all. He may field his nephew Tej Pratap Singh Yadav, who is the son-in-law of Lalu Yadav of RJD, in Kannauj.
The BSP has named 36 Lok Sabha candidates in Uttar Pradesh so far. The party, which had contested just 38 seats in 2019 as it was in alliance with SP and RLD, this time intends to contest all 80 seats.
Notably, after forming a government with a simple majority (206 seats) in UP in 2007, the BSP has been witnessing a downslide. In the 2009 general election, the BSP vote percentage slipped to 27.42 per cent in UP. In 2012, Mayawati lost it to the SP and in 2014, her party failed to open its account in Lok Sabha. Its vote percentage came down to 25.19 per cent in 2014 and further slipped to 19.77 per cent. In 2019, though BSP won 10 seats, its vote percentage came down to 19.43. The drastic fall in its performance was registered in the 2022 Assembly election when the party could win just one seat of 403 in UP with a vote percentage of 12.83.
