The collapse of a party: Days to go for Lok Sabha polls, where are Mayawati, BSP?

With the Lok Sabha elections set to be announced any day now, the Mayawati-led party is floundering, with no directions from the top, its sitting MPs either already out or looking to exit, its leaders baffled at the BSP’s no-alliance stand, and its leadership giving mixed messaging regarding the BJP.

As the other parties in UP work out tie-ups, and go about consolidating caste votes, including the BSP’s core base of Dalits, Mayawati remains more inaccessible than ever.

The seeming disinterest towards the general elections is particularly striking as in 2019, the BSP had won the second-highest number of seats in UP, at 10 out of 80, even if this was way behind the BJP’s 62. That result incidentally had come on the back of a “historic alliance” between the BSP and SP, with the SP winning 5 seats.

BSP supporters at a rally in 2019. (Express photo)

Between the 2019 general elections, when it got around 22% of the vote share (contesting 38 seats in its alliance with the SP), to the 2022 Assembly polls, the BSP vote share saw a huge 10% fall. At 12.8% of the votes, while contesting all the 403 seats, the BSP got just a little more than the votes it had got in its very first election after its formation, in 1993.

Between 1993 and 2022, the BSP had never got less than 19% of the votes in UP. In the 2007 Assembly elections, when it swept to power with a three-fourth majority, stringing together a broad coalition of Dalits and upper castes, it had got 30.7% of the votes.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, when the BSP did not win a single seat in UP, it still had a vote share of 19.77%. In the 2017 Assembly polls, when it won 19 seats, it had a vote share of 22.23%.

The BSP’s 2022 vote share, in fact, tallied almost exactly with what the share of Jatav votes – the Dalit sub-caste Mayawati belongs to – in UP is said to be. Dalits make up 21% of all votes in UP and Jatavs alone account for about 13%. The BSP was seen as having lost the minority support it used to get in previous elections; and party leaders fear that given that the party seems to be leaning towards the BJP now, that will further recede.

In fact, in the lead-up to the elections, the Congress made several attempts to get the BSP on board the INDIA alliance – but was thwarted by Mayawati repeatedly.

Now, as the SP, which is in alliance with the Congress, has already started announcing candidates for the Lok Sabha polls, as has the BJP, leaders of the BSP are waiting for Mayawati to start the process.

Party leaders and workers admit they are not sure what’s going on in Mayawati’s mind. But that, given that the party has not done much since the 2022 Assembly elections, any “miracle” recovery in the Lok Sabha polls is out of the question.

For, or against, BJP?

In the recent Rajya Sabha elections, BSP leaders were taken by surprise by the party’s call to vote for the BJP. The February 27 poll saw the BJP pick up an extra seat, taking its tally to 8, after engineering cross-voting from SP ranks.

A BSP leader asked what more proof was needed that the party is “supporting the BJP”. “Our lone MLA had the choice to abstain from voting, to send out a message that the party was against the BJP (particularly as the BJP did not really need its vote to win). But, he (Umashankar Singh) voted for the BJP, and Mayawatiji didn’t say anything about it. This made it clear (to everyone) that the party is not there in the fight against the BJP,” the BSP leader said.

Umashankar was also part of the MLA group that visited the Ayodhya Ram Temple on February 12, as part of a tour organised by the BJP state government, and also praised the “arrangements”. He balanced it by saying his party would also visit the mosque being built in place of the Babri Masjid. Incidentally, while the SP MLAs skipped the tour, the two Congress MLAs also attended.

Earlier too, whether during election to the posts of President and Vice-President, inauguration of the new Parliament building (when most of the Opposition stayed away), and the women’s reservation Bill, the BSP sided with the Modi government at the Centre.

SP president Akhilesh Yadav with BSP chief Mayawati ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls that the two parties fought together.  To Mayawati’s right is her nephew Akash Anand. (Express Photo by Vishal Srivastav)

Other party leaders note that even when Mayawati does attack the BJP, she makes it a point to also attack the Congress in the same breath (and, to a lesser extent, the SP). And that she avoids making a direct comment against Prime Minister Narendra Modi or UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.

A BSP leader, who is set to cross over to the SP, said that the party’s Muslim leaders are apprehensive that even if they are re-fielded by the party, their chances of winning are low. “Apart from the Dalits, who is going to vote for us? Even if we go to Muslims and ask them for votes, they will raise the issue of the BSP being with the BJP. Hence, we have no choice but to join other parties.”

Besides, SP national president Akhilesh Yadav is also making a concerted push for the Dalit vote to expand his base beyond the Yadavs and Muslims, by coining the ‘PDA’ formulation, standing for Pichchde, Dalit, Adivasi. The BJP has also been successful in getting some Dalit vote to its side.

Asked about the BSP MLA voting for the BJP candidate in the Rajya Sabha polls, BSP state president Vishwanath Pal said, “Our leader (Mayawati) told the MLA (Umashankar) that he was free to vote for whichever candidate asked for his vote. The SP didn’t ask for it, Sanjay Seth (the BJP candidate) did, and he voted for him. The vote was for Sethji and not the BJP.”

Soon after the Rajya Sabha elections, the Centre appeared to have responded in kind, clearing Y-plus security for BSP national coordinator Akash Anand, seen as the party’s No. 2.

The thinning ranks

Of the 10 sitting BSP MPs in UP, the two Muslim representatives have already left the party.

Amroha MP Danish Ali was the first to head out. Ali, who faced communal slurs on the floor of Parliament from BJP MP Ramesh Bidhuri, was suspended by the BSP not long after, for “anti-party activities” after he joined the walkout from Parliament in support of TMC MP Mahua Moitra.

Ali later joined the launch of Congress MP Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra from Manipur, and is expected to be fielded by the Congress from Amroha.

The second to leave was Afzal Ansari, the MP from Ghazipur and the brother of gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari. Afzal was immediately declared by the SP as its candidate from Ghazipur.

Recently, Shah Alam Guddu Jamali, who has been a BSP MLA twice from Mubarakpur, joined the SP.

One of the biggest BSP leaders to leave has been its Ambedkarnagar sitting MP Ritesh Pandey. Joining the BJP, he spoke about being neglected by the BSP leadership. Pandey’s father Rakesh Pandey is an SP MLA from Jalalpur seat in Ambedkarnagar district.

After Pandey’s resignation, BSP president Mayawati asked her party MPs to introspect whether they followed the party’s guidelines. However, other MPs too indicated to The Indian Express that they were looking out.

The vote shares of BSP in Assembly and Lok Sabha since 2007. (Express graphic by Anjishnu Das)

BSP leader Pal says the party is not worried about these exits, and that the candidate list will be decided soon as per “the party’s mission”.

“Danish Ali had already been suspended by the party, while Ritesh Pandey had stopped using the BSP flag after his father became an SP MLA. He refused to even put up photographs of Mayawatiji… Every party changes its candidates in elections. Those who work for the Bahujan movement will get tickets from the party,” Pal says.

Asked what the BSP’s “mission” was, Pal said, “Since the country got Independence and Dr B R Ambedkar’s Constitution came into existence, the parties ruling this country have not honestly implemented it. Our mission is to get power for the deprived communities and make sure that the Constitution is fully implemented. Only then will there be social justice.”

On Mayawati’s inaccessibility, he said, “Anyone can meet her. It is easier than meeting the state president of a party.”

The BSP footprint

But it’s not just in UP that the BSP chief has receded from the scene. The party still counts among the six parties with “national” status in the country, because of the votes it picks up in other states besides UP. However, in the recent Assembly elections in states where the BSP has traditionally done well – such as Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan – Mayawati hardly turned up to campaign.

The BSP ended up with 2 seats in Rajasthan, with 1.82% vote share, and came third on 110 seats in MP, with 3.38% of the votes. It also picked up 2.05% of the votes in Chhattisgarh.

Where Mayawati continues to count is in the role of a spoiler because of the votes the BSP can still tap – a prospect that the anti-BJP parties fear.

A senior Congress leader said the BSP will definitely do some damage to the INDIA alliance in the upcoming polls. “The BSP still has 12-13% of the vote share, of the Dalit community. Plus, the party’s candidates, whichever castes they belong to, will get some votes from their castes. So yes, we are mindful of this, and it is a big loss that the BSP didn’t join the INDIA alliance despite repeated attempts by our party’s top leadership,” said the leader.

SP national spokesperson Farazuddin Kidwai slammed Mayawati for “almost surrendering the BSP’s mission to the ruling BJP” “The BSP was formed to fight for the Bahujan Samaj, and this movement was led by honourable Kanshi Ram. Today’s BSP has completely lost its path. Their workers are highly disappointed and are looking at Akhilesh Yadav as their leader,” Kidwai said.