Newsmaker | Dara Singh Chauhan back, boost for BJP efforts to consolidate non-Yadav OBC votes

Chauhan’s return to the BJP bodes well for the party. He belongs to the Nonia-Chauhan community, an Other Backward Class (OBC) group with significant numbers in eastern Uttar Pradesh’s Azamgarh and Varanasi districts. Sources in the BJP said that the party hopes to consolidate non-Yadav OBC votes with Chauhan’s help. Current Meghalaya Governor Phagu Chauhan was another prominent OBC face for the BJP in UP. But ever since he moved to take charge as the Governor of Bihar in July 2019, the party did not have a known OBC face. The BJP has also recently forged an alliance with OBC leader Om Prakash Rajbhar and his Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) in its attempt to further firm up the OBC base.

That Chauhan was uncomfortable with the SP and was going to switch sides was clear for a while now. Sources in the Akhilesh Yadav-led party told The Indian Express that Chauhan was “inactive in the party for the past several months”. Several BJP leaders such as state unit president Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary and Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya attended a function organised by Chauhan in February, sparking speculation about his return to the ruling party.

SP to BSP to BJP and back

Chauhan started his political career with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and became Rajya Sabha MP in 1996. He joined the SP in 2000 and was nominated by the party to the Upper House for a second term the same year.

His first stint with the BJP began in 2015. That year, party sources said, Chauhan “impressed” Union Home Minister Amit Shah with his arrangements at a rally in Azamgarh. Singh was appointed national president of BJP’s OBC morcha days after the rally.

He made his debut in the Assembly elections in 2017 when he contested from Madhuban in Mau district. Chauhan was then appointed the Cabinet minister for Forests, Environment and Animal Husbandry in the Yogi Adityanath Cabinet. BJP sources said if Chauhan wins the Ghosi bypoll, he is again likely to be inducted into the Cabinet.

The bypoll will be held on September 5 along with six other Assembly constituencies in five states. Votes will be counted on September 8