Uttar Pradesh - 2017 Election
The first phase of voting in Uttar Pradesh was held on 11 February 2017. The election in the state is to be held in seven phases. A total of 836 candidates would battle it out in the first phase. Of the 836 candidates, 168 had criminal cases pending against them and 302 are crorepatis [persons whose assets are worth at least one crore or 10 million rupees - in the Indian numbering system the unit "crore" is 10 million].
In 2014, it was the idea of Modi as PM that delivered UP to the BJP. But having shed their core issues such as Akhand Bharat, Article 370 and Uniform Civil Code, besides, of course, the Ram temple at Ayodhya, there was little left to distinguish BJP from the rest.
Prime Minister Modi launched attack at the ruling Samajwadi party in the state and said, “When Shri Akhilesh Yadav won, the expectations were huge. We thought a young CM will do well but UP is disappointed. The ruling party in Uttar Pradesh has to give an account of their work but they aren’t doing so. Instead they are asking what Modi has done. They should tell what they have done for welfare of the state.”
Modi said that corruption had badly gripped the state and BJP Government was committed to rid Uttar Pradesh of its troubles. He added, “Our Government eliminated interview process for class III and IV jobs. This has drastically reduced corruption.”
PM Modi hit out hard at UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and on the other he aggressively wooed two sections of the voters - Jats and small traders. In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Jats had voted en bloc for the BJP, helping it win all the seats in the region. The petty traders in both the rural and urban areas have apparently turned against BJP after the note-ban move.
The elections in Uttar Pradesh were distributed in seven phases beginning February 11, the first phase. The second phase voting would be held on February 15, third phase voting would be on 19. Voting for the fourth and fifth phase would be held on February 23 and February 27 respectively. Sixth and seventh phase voting would be held on March 4 and March 8 respectively. Votes would be counted on March 11 along with other four states of Punjab, Goa, Uttarakhand and Manipur.
A total of 73 constituencies in 15 districts would go to poll in the first phase. Voting would be held in the districts of Agra, Aligarh, Bulandshahar, Etah, Firozabad, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Ghaziabad, Hapur, Hathras, Kasganj, Mathura, Meerut, Muzaffarnagar and Shamli. In the district of Muzaffarnagar which saw rioting some time back had 80 candidates contesting for 6 assembly seats. 16 candidates are fighting it out in Muzaffarnagar constituency itself.
Gaurav Swaroop of SP, Kapil Dev of BJP, Rakesh Sharma, BSP and Payal Mahaswatri of RLD and 12 others were fighting the elections. The Jat voters generally dominate the western Uttar Pradesh where the voting was being held in the first phase. The ruling Samajwadi Party formed the government in 2012 when it fought the election under Mulayam Singh Yadav and dislodged Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party by winning a clear majority with 224 seats in the house of 403.
The SP-Congress combine was pitched against the BJP and the BSP in a triangular contest across the state.The BJP was upbeat after forming a government at the center and relying on the charisma of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It did not have an impressive show in the last elections and garnered only 47 seats, four down from the previous tally of 51. Most of the poll surveys saw a fight between SP-congress alliance and the BJP, giving much less weight to Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party.
Mayawati was hoping to return to power with Dalit and Muslim votes have given good number of tickets to Muslims along with Dalits but the road to Lucknow may not be an easy one as the Muslim votes are likely to split. She is also banking upon the anti-incumbency factor of the present SP government and feud in the Samajwadi Party which may work to her advantage. In the last elections held in 2012 BSP secured only 80 seats and became the second largest party though falling way back from the winner Samajwadi Party which secured an absolute majority with 224 seats.
The BJP won close to 300 seats in the 403-member Uttar Pradesh Assembly. The BJP is well on the course to win close to 300 seats in the 403-member Uttar Pradesh Assembly. A saffron sweep is visible across the length and breadth of Uttar Pradesh, except some pockets where Samajwadi Party has done well. The Samajwadi Party had won majority on its own by winning 224 seats in 2012 but this time SP-Congress alliance were not looking to win even 75 seats. The Uttar Pradesh election results established that the "Modi wave" was still sweeping the landscape of the most populous state of the country. The Akhilesh-Rahul alliance did not work in Uttar Pradesh, where a majority of the voters are below 35 years of age.
The BJP had been expected to perform well in UP, but few experts had predicted the scale of the victory in elections viewed as a test of Modi's popularity after a controversial ban on high-value banknotes. Experts said the results showed Modi had succeeded in tapping into popular anger over corruption with the move, which was aimed at tackling tax evasion but also led to widespread chaos in a country where most transactions are cash-based.
Low-caste leader Mayawati, whose Bahujan Samaj Party was in third place in UP, said the results were "shocking" and asked the election commission to investigate the possibility voting machines had been tampered with.
After Adityanath took the reins of the state government, police deployed "anti-Romeo squads" meant to keep men and women apart in public to protect women from harassment. But they are also seen by some as an extension of Adityanath's battle against what he calls the "love jihad," or the "entrapment" of Hindu women to convert them to Islam. At one rally Adityanath vowed, "If one Hindu girl marries a Muslim man, then we will take 100 Muslim girls in return." He went on, "If they (Muslims) kill one Hindu man, then we will kill 100 Muslim men." In 2015, he defended the lynching of a Muslim man in Dadri who was accused of possessing and consuming beef. He once said that Mother Teresa was part of a Christianisation conspiracy in northeast India. On another occasion, Adityanath said that if given a chance, he would place the Hindu idol of Ganesh in all mosques. Adityanath said that those citizens who opposed yoga should leave the country and drown themselves.
In a front-page story, the Times of India called the selection of the "saffron hardliner" a "defiant assertion" of the party's Hindu nationalist credentials. "By picking him to govern India's largest state, Modi and (BJP President Amit) Shah have sent a clear message that they will be bound by neither the norms of 'politics as usual' nor the requirements of political correctness," the Times wrote.
Mohsin Raza was the only Muslim in the 50-member council of ministers who were sworn-in on a hectic afternoon. Raza's name did come as a huge surprise for all as the BJP had not cared to field even a single Muslim candidate in the recent state election.
This win altered the composition of the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP and its allies were still in a minority. The Rajya Sabha, India’s upper house of Parliament, had 250 seats. The BJP had 56, three behind the Congress’s 59 seats. Uttar Pradesh, owing to its population size, has the highest representation in the Rajya Sabha, with 31 members. Since the tenure in the Rajya Sabha is six years, 10 of the 31 seats in Uttar Pradesh will be vacant by 2019. Even with all these gains, a majority would still elude the BJP in the Rajya Sabha. But the BJP would have more opportunity to pass laws deemed controversial by the Opposition since they would have a smaller gap to bridge to get a majority.
Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi formed an alliance in Uttar Prades, convinced that this partnership would pose a formidable challenge to the Bharatiya Janata Party and succeed in halting the saffron outfit’s onward march. They believed that a Dalit-Muslim combination would certainly defeat the BJP. Sceptics in the Samajwadi Party and the Congress were proved right. Akhilesh Yadav’s image make-over failed to endear him to the electorate, and the Congress added no value to the alliance as the party had virtually no support base in Uttar Pradesh.
Samajwadi Party dislodged the BSP from power in 2012 with its brand of social engineering. Party leader Akhilesh Yadav was embroiled in a long-drawn squabble for power with his father Mulayam Singh Yadav and uncle Shivpal Yadav within the Samajwadi Party. Shivpal Yadav, known to be the party’s chief organiser, fielded rebel candidates against the Samajwadi Party’s official candidates in a clear attempt to undermine his nephew.
Akhilesh emerged victorious with the Election Commission recognising his faction as the true Samajwadi Party, assigning him the poll symbol. Mulayam and Shivpal Yadav openly expressed their opposition to Akhilesh Yadav's style of functioning. Akhilesh responded by allying with Congress hoping that his association with Rahul Gandhi would woo the youths of Uttar Pradesh. But it was said the two parties had come together primarily to woo the Muslims.
The BJP revised its strategy by focusing on Other Backward Classes [OBCs] who did not support the Yadav clan and non-Jatav Dalits. This move not only countered the Yadav vote-bank of the Samajwadi Party but gave the BJP a definite edge in the elections.
Uttar Pradesh's Jatav population had emerged the clear leader among the 66 communities listed as scheduled castes. According to Census 2011 data, the Jatav community, identified with different names cross the state, has the highest number - 2,24,96,047-- constituting 54.23% of UP's total scheduled caste population.
The victory was seen as an endorsement of PM Modi's high-risk decision in November 2016 to scrap high-value banknotes worth 86 per cent of the cash in circulation. For all the fury and helplessness demonetisation generated, it also firmed up existing identities and political choices rather than bringing radical shifts in political positions. People made their arguments to justify their choices, not the other way around. Jatavs were firmly with the BSP and the Jats agree with the BJP.
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