BJP failed to play caste card, RSS didn146;t bridge gap

Did the BJP miss one big tactic that could have helped it put up a better show in caste-ridden Uttar Pradesh?

Did the BJP miss one big tactic that could have helped it put up a better show in caste-ridden Uttar Pradesh? As the party looked for answers to explain its worst electoral performance in the state since 1985, there was a thinking that the party had not played the caste card well. As a top BJP leader suggested, given the Brahmin vote base in Uttar Pradesh, it might have been a worthwhile ploy to find a strong Brahmin candidate as the face of the party to counter the SP and the BSP.

The party never found such a candidate, but the BJP leader was speaking the obvious: that it had not been able to anticipate the so-called 8216;tactical voting8217; by Brahmins to oust Mulayam Singh Yadav as they sided with Mayawati and was now left ruing a missed chance. Its chief ministerial candidate 8212; Kalyan Singh 8212; was at best a compromise candidate and not good enough to pull the BJP8217;s election campaign. This could well be the end of the road for him.

Then, as results began coming in, party chief Rajnath Singh was aware that much of the blame would now land at his door because with a tally of over 200 meetings and rallies over a month, he had been the BJP8217;s star campaigner. It was an election in which BJP state President Kesri Nath Tripathi lost, as did Kalyan Singh8217;s son Rajvir from what was regarded as a Lodh stronghold. Sone Lal Patel, with whose Apna Dal Rajnath Singh had always been keen on an alliance despite opposition from Kalyan Singh, was among the major losers on Friday. And Gorakhpur MP Adityanath failed to deliver despite the hype over his ability to keep the Hindu vote intact.

Perhaps the biggest myth to be shattered was that of the RSS, which had placed its organisation secretaries in districts across the state to monitor the election effort. It was an effort personally overseen by party general secretary organisation Ram Lal. The election results proved those efforts were of little use.

More importantly, the BJP8217;s surge in urban areas, as witnessed during the Uttarakhand and Punjab polls as also in the local polls in Lucknow and Maharashtra, was absent this time.

The poor showing in the election also indicated that in the run-up to the Presidential polls the party would no longer have a 8220;deciding factor8221;.

After a brief meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Board on Friday, Rajnath Singh said he was conceding defeat but not necessarily taking responsibility and said the UP BJP Legislature Party would meet soon to elect a new leader. Singh admitted that he had failed to read the writing on the wall and had been carried away by attendance at some meetings.

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Miscalculations have been a routine feature of the BJP8217;s election effort. For one, the party could not gauge that the anti-incumbency sentiment would cover sitting MLAs too. The decision to field sitting MLAs has been one factor in the loss. Besides, its ill-conceived efforts to keep 8220;all doors open8221; 8212; a euphemism for willingness to talk to either the SP or the BSP on an alliance 8212; did not win the party any points.

Add to that the inability to read the importance of caste in Uttar Pradesh. As one BJP general secretary explained, despite the campaign on development and law and order issues, people voted for their caste candidates and the BJP8217;s selection of candidates was unable to take advantage of that.