Post-Lok Sabha Elections | As rumblings in UP BJP get louder, state unit chief meets PM

There have been signs of dissent emerging in the BJP’s state unit after the party’s poor show in the Lok Sabha elections — the BJP’s tally fell from 62 out of 80 seats in UP in 2019 to just 33. The Samajwadi Party (SP) edged past the BJP with 37 seats; the Congress won another six in alliance with the SP.

Earlier in the day, Maurya reiterated his statement that the sangathan (party/ organisation) is bigger than the government. “Sangathan sarkar se badaa hai; karyakartaon ka dard mera dard hai; sangathan se koi badaa nahin, karyakarta hi gaurav hai (The party/ organisation is bigger than the government; the pain of party workers is my pain; nobody is bigger than the party/ organisation; the party worker is our pride),” he posted on X.

He had made similar comments — seen as a veiled attack on Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, suggesting that he was ignoring party workers and running the state through the bureaucracy — at a state party meeting earlier, which was attended by Nadda, where Adityanath had blamed “over-confidence” for the electoral reverses in the state and suggested that the party could not effectively counter the INDIA bloc’s campaign.

According to sources, the BJP’s central leadership has told Maurya that leaders should avoid making statements that may affect the party’s future prospects. With the party’s top brass speaking to both Maurya and Chaudhary, they seem to be taking steps to put their house in order against a resurgent Opposition in the state.

Meanwhile, Adityanath, on Wednesday, held a ministerial meeting to delegate responsibilities for the upcoming bypolls for 10 Assembly seats. Both his deputies, Maurya and Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak, were not a part of the meeting. The Election Commission is likely to announce the date for the bypolls soon.

Besides Maurya, the party’s Badlapur MLA, Ramesh Chandra Mishra, also said days ago that the party’s situation wasn’t good, and it would find the going difficult in 2027. He had asked the central leadership to intervene. In a later video, however, he said that he was misunderstood.

Earlier, BJP MLC Devendra Pratap Singh also wrote to Adityanath questioning the functioning of the government and alleging that party workers were not being respected.

On Monday, a minister in the UP government and chief of the NISHAD Party, Sanjay Nishad, raised the issue of “misuse of bulldozer against the poor”. “Garib ko ujadenge toh woh hamein ujadega rajneeti mein (Uproot the poor, and they will uproot us in politics),” he said.

Under pressure, the state government has put two recent decisions on hold – the demolition for the Kukrail river project and digitisation of teachers’ attendance at government schools.

A senior national BJP leader said the party leadership was not seeking to indict anyone for the poll loss in UP. Rather, it was trying to steady the ship, while steering clear of pinning individual blame. All signs are that the BJP is trying to avoid visible infighting at the moment and portray an image of unity and continuity.

Even as Maurya has continued his attacks, Adityanath has been holding meetings with leaders, individually or in small groups, from across the state. Photographs of these meetings are posted on X, from the official handle of the Chief Minister’s Office, seen as a subtle message that he retains his hold on the state unit.

“When Maurya says that he feels the pain of party workers, is he not Deputy CM? Is he outside the government? The government does not mean only the CM. He, as Deputy CM, should also have addressed the concerns, if any, of party workers, rather than spreading negativity,” said a BJP source close to Adityanath.

Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav has alleged “infighting” in the BJP and claimed it was harming people’s welfare. “In the heat of the struggle for power within the BJP, governance and administration in UP have been put on the back-burner. The work of sabotage politics that the BJP used to do in other parties, it is now doing the same inside its own party. That is why the BJP is sinking in the quagmire of internal conflicts. There is none in the BJP who thinks about the public,” he said in a post on X.

Responding to this, Maurya posted: “The BJP has a strong organisation and government, both in the Centre and the state. SP’s PDA is a fraud. The return of SP’s hooliganism in UP is impossible. The BJP will repeat 2017 in the 2027 Assembly elections.”