A Letter From Uttar Pradesh: The final countdown

Slogans vie with snatches of song: “Hindu hain hum, bas Ram ki baat karein (We are Hindus, talk only of Ram)… Sabko pension aur shauchalaya (pension and toilets for all)… Yeh dharm yudh hai (this is a religious war) … Mathura Vrindavan abhi baaki hai (Mathura and Vrindavan are yet to come)… Jai Shri Ram… Har Har Mahadev”.

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“Aayenge phir Yogi hi (it will only be Yogi)” is the chorus on loudspeakers and emblazoned on t-shirts of young men who push their way through the throng. The BJP’s Yuva Morcha has turned out in strength, so has its Mahila Morcha. A rath-like vehicle is set to accompany the CM’s motorcade, and there is a strong police presence.

As Yogi’s cavalcade rolls up to Townhall, the song and slogan and blowing of conch shells give way to the rising, ringing chant of Sanskrit shlokas by Brahmin priests.

Yogi didn’t make a speech as his roadshow started from Townhall that day. He didn’t need to. The spectacle was the message.

It spoke of a personality cult, or two, a twinning actually. If the BJP won the last election riding on the Modi leher or wave in UP, this election has seen the makings of the cult of Yogi. He is pitching himself as the protector and promoter of a Hindutva that is more in-your-face than it has ever been, cum “Bulldozer Baba”, whose favoured instrument to rule is the police.

In UP 2022, “Yogi-Modi” or “Modi-Yogi”, backed by the BJP organisation, use of high tech and harnessing of schemes, resources and symbols of state, is the formidable combination to defeat.

Incidentally, the only other leader mentioned in the slogans on that Gorakhpur afternoon was Rajnath Singh. He is a former UP chief minister, former BJP president, and current Union defence minister. But it doesn’t take great skills at reading political code to see why he alone was invoked alongside Modi-Yogi. Singh is a Thakur. As much as it seeks to label its political opponent as casteist, and for all that the label mostly sticks, caste is a critical component of the BJP’s own arsenal and pitch.

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Two days after the Yogi roadshow in Gorakhpur, Akhilesh Yadav shared the stage with his allies — and much more prominently, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, in Varanasi.

Didi’s awkward Hindi seemed not to come in the way of her forceful attack on Yogi-Modi. She described the UP government’s “anti-Romeo squads” as anti-young and called attention to the invisibilisation of Siya or Sita in the BJP slogan “Jai Shri Ram”. She spoke of migrants abandoned by BJP governments during the pandemic-induced lockdown, and about the stranded students in Ukraine. She recited a Sanskrit mantra, one arm dramatically held aloft, and several lines of “ai mere watan ke logo”, threw a large white football into the crowd and her now-trademark challenge: “Khela hoga, hoga na (the game is on, isn’t it?”

SP chief Akhilesh Yadav campaigning in the prestige seat of Varanasi on Friday evening, the day before campaigning ended. (PTI)

Mamata’s presence on his stage was a symbolic force-multiplier for the main challenger of Modi-Yogi: The Modi-BJP can be defeated, it said, it happened in West Bengal. But if Akhilesh Yadav seemed in danger of being overshadowed in Varanasi — his own pitch seemed decidedly less fiery than Mamata’s, as he asked the crowd, “aap log naraaz ho ke nahin BJP se, bhool toh nahin jaaoge, maaf toh nahin kar doge (you are angry with the BJP, are you not, you won’t forget or forgive, will you)?” — it may not have been entirely incidental.

Despite the fact that the Akhilesh-led SP enjoyed five years in power with a wide mandate, 2012 to 2017, followed by five years as the BJP government’s main Opposition, he is painted by his opponents as someone who is still not entirely in charge, and seen even by supporters as a work in progress.

Outside its core and committed base, Akhilesh is still not free of the spectres attached to memories of SP rule — of family strife, “goonda raj (lumpenism)”, undue favours to Yadavs and Muslims, and of the state ceding critical space to local dons and chieftains.

In this election, the SP’s appeal is an assortment, a sum of many parts which remain local and separate, with no overriding appeal of persona, no synced themes — unlike the Yogi-Modi choreography and phalanx of Suraksha-Hindutva-Scheme.

To begin with, in many places, as in Akhilesh’s own Lok Sabha constituency and old party bastion of Azamgarh — the SP’s Durga Prasad Yadav has been MLA here for a staggering eight consecutive terms — it rests on its traditional M-Y formula.

There is resentment about Akhilesh’s prolonged absences in Azamgarh — posters were put up earlier in the city about the “lapataa sansad (missing MP)” and many here draw comparisons with Modi’s frequent visits to neighbouring Varanasi. Yet, says Shah Abid, who is on the management committee of the city’s prestigious Shibli National College, “The M-Y combination is functional here, it delivers. If you ask, 90 out of 100 people in the city will predict an SP sweep.”

Signs of consolidation in favour of the SP are evident in Yadav mohallas from Lucknow to Varanasi — some may say they voted for Modi at the Centre last time, but in the state, they list reasons to vote against the BJP.

In Bani village in district Barabanki, Harinath Yadav says: “Modi is fine at the Centre, we also gave donations for the Ram temple at Ayodhya… but everything has gone wrong here in UP. They give us free rations with one hand, and take away more than that out of our pocket with price rise.” Gudia says: “We didn’t get jobs and cattle are eating up our crop, so what have we got?”

PM Narendra Modi campaigning in the prestige seat of Varanasi on Friday evening, the day before campaigning ended. (PTI)

Even in its bastion, however, the SP recognises that it needs to woo the non-core vote to win — the smaller, more scattered non-Yadav backward castes that have traditionally resented Yadav dominance and that played a big role in swinging the 2017 election for the Modi-BJP.

In Azamgarh, Dinesh Kumar Yadav, SP state secretary, who looks after the pichhda prakoshth (backward caste cell), says: “This time, we have given almost 40 per cent bhaagidaari to the Rajbhar, Chauhan, Maurya, Nishad, Prajapati, Jaiswal. It used to be 25 to 30 per cent.” And Nafees Ahmed, sitting SP MLA Gopalpur, says: “Our focus has always been sarv samaj (the whole of society), but it has become bigger. Iss baar hamne jodne ka kaam kiya hai, chhodne ka nahin (we have tried to include this time, not exclude).”

A strategic focus on non-Yadav OBCs shows in the SP’s ticket distribution, and in its alliances with parties like the Apna Dal (K) and Om Prakash Rajbhar’s SBSP. On the ground, it shows mixed results.

In the Kurmi mohalla of village Atwai, district Ambedkar Nagar, a group of voters talks of naukri-padhai-saand (joblessness, setback to education, and marauding cattle). But as the conversation goes on, it becomes clear that the shift of Lalji Verma, a prominent Kurmi leader from these parts, from the BSP to the SP, is also a factor. Verma is one of the influential OBC leaders in this erstwhile BSP stronghold who switched sides to the SP on poll-eve.

But in the Rajbhar locality at Khwaja Jahanpur of Mau, Poojan, a power loom worker, says: “The SBSP may go wherever it sees fit. This time it is with the SP, but last time it was with the BJP. We can’t follow it around just because we are Rajbhars.”

If the Yadav voter seems to be rallying behind the SP, and the non-Yadav backward caste voter looks less single-minded, support for the SP in the Muslim mohalla is tinged with helplessness, cynicism or resignation.

In Manikpur village in Mau, Sheikh Hisamuddin, a social worker, says: “They (Yogi-Modi) say sabka saath sabka vikas, but their heart is not in it… When they talk of putting down the mafia, they only take Muslim names. What about Raja Bhaiyya, Dhananjay Singh, Tribhuvan Singh? Gundon ki biradari nahin hoti (the lumpen have no religion).” And Mohammad Mobin Chaudhary, a farmer, says: “Sahme sahme se rahte hain (we are anxious and subdued)… From Pehlu Khan to Tabrez Ansari and Mohammed Akhlaq, there was no justice for the lynchings… Now they have raised the hijab controversy.”

In Kopaganj town of Mau, businessman Abdul Azeem Khan remembers an older SP: “Mulayam Singh’s party would do dharna pradarshan (demonstrations), go to jail. Akhilesh’s party did not come forward on CAA-NRC.”

In Sanjarpur village in district Azamgarh, Rafat Ahmed, who works in Saudi Arabia, and is back home since the lockdown, says: “Wherever and whenever there is an issue that affects us, Akhilesh goes silent…”

Several young men who were arrested after the Batla House encounter in the national capital in 2008 belonged to Sanjarpur, and the village is still fighting the taint. “The whole village is placed in the dock… If politics does not speak for us, we must speak for ourselves. That is why many more children in Sanjarpur are studying now, and going out for higher education to Aligarh and Delhi.”

In this election, then, the SP’s challenge is made of this — it counts on discontents that cleave to the ground, most of all berozgari or unemployment, and mehengai or price rise, which makes them powerful but also harnesses them to other untidy ground-level realities, loyalties, cleavages, shifts. On the other side, Modi-Yogi have appropriated the planks of “dharm” and “desh”, religion and country, that are able to, when required, lift their campaign clear off the ground.

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In a polarised election, the BJP and SP are also borrowing lines from each other.

Yogi flaunts many of Akhilesh’s schemes after renaming them — “Dial 100”, the mobile application launched by the SP government, was changed by the Yogi government to “112”. That is not all.

In the high-profile contest in Gorakhpur, the SP candidate against Yogi is a BJP veteran’s widow, her tragic loss her election pitch — her candidature is said to be the SP’s bid to woo the Brahmin vote.

Shubhawati Shukla — wife of Upendra Dutt Shukla, who was in the BJP for 42 years, and who died last year in May — campaigns from door to door, looking pale and distraught. “Unka nidhan hua… 20 maheena Yogi ji nahin aaye (my husband died, Yogi did not come for 20 months)…,” she says.

In 2018, Shukla’s husband was the BJP candidate who famously lost the by-election in Yogi’s backyard. He was defeated by Praveen Nishad, then on an SP ticket, and whose party has now tied up with the BJP.

At the Nishad Party office in a basement in Gorakhpur’s Padri Bazar, Muralidhar Nishad, rashtriya sanrakshak (national guardian), says: “There is no enmity in politics…” The Nishad Party’s main issue remains the same, says Mahendra Singh Nishad, national secretary: “We are counted in the OBCs, but we should be in the category of kindred SC groups who make their living by the river — Kevat, Mallah, Majhwar.” It is crucial that the Nishad get the correct quota, they say, because only then will they be able to get representation and voice in places that matter, at thana and tehsil.

The wheels of Mandal are still turning, and in UP, Mandir is only a ride away.

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The Mayawati campaign has been more difficult to spot than usual in this election. At a rally in Bhathat on the outskirts of Gorakhpur, BSP district president Santosh Kumar Jigyasu says: “In 2017, the BSP had nearly 23 per cent of the vote, and the SP got less. Even in the Modi tsunami, the BSP held its own. The media is sold out. We have been at work on the ground well before the election, we are a mission, not a party.”

The BSP candidate, Deepak Aggarwal, also on the rally stage, is a businessman who has been politically footloose — he has come to the BSP, he says, via the Hindu Mahasabha and Congress. But of course, the BSP’s strong point has never been its candidates. It is its core voter, who needs no proof of Mayawati’s physical presence or formal electioneering.

In the Chamar basti of village Atwai in Ambedkar Nagar, the argument for Behenji is strong and articulate. Says Sumita: “There is a lot of difference when Behenji is in power. Law and order becomes better, women feel safest in her rule.” And Shivani asks: “Kis taraf hai suraksha (where is the much-touted security)? There has been no justice till now for the crime at Hathras.”

On law and order, Mayawati’s tenure in power draws praise even in non-Dalit localities — both Yogi and Mayawati credibly claim law and order as a political USP while the SP is on the backfoot. But what should worry the BSP is this: Her core vote may not be marking her attendance, but among the non-core voters she needs to win, a lack of visible outreach could take a toll.

In the Pasi (SC) mohalla of Rajapur village in district Barabanki, Mukesh Chand, a small farmer, says: “The BSP spent too much money on Ambedkar parks. Like the BJP spends on the Ram mandir.” Immediately, Jitendra Kumar counters: “How can you compare the two? One is a dev sthan (abode of God), the other a mere park.”

In Mau’s Manikpur village, where the BSP’s candidate is a strong presence in a triangular contest, social worker Sheikh Hisamuddin articulates the wider worry about the BSP: “Both the SP and BSP were weakened after 2017, the BJP lured many of their prominent leaders away. But the BSP’s problem also is that their non-core voters may no longer be with them.” In a state like UP, he says, a party can win only if it has at least three groups in its fold — “jab tak teen ka sangam nahin hoga…”

Many point to another apprehension that works against the BSP — there is no guarantee that Mayawati will not tie up later with the BJP, she has done it before, they say.

The fourth wheel of the UP contest, the Congress, is enjoying new visibility because of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. But even its supporters acknowledge that the party can only hope for an increase in its vote share, “filhaal (for now)”. For the Congress, this UP election is training ground for the main battle in 2024 at the Centre, or the next Assembly election in UP, many say.

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In Varanasi’s Pappu ki dukaan, the nondescript but famous tea shop a stone’s throw from Assi Ghat, where people from various walks of life stop for chai, and where the political conversation is more elliptical, less blunt, Banaras-style — PM Modi stopped here, too, for a cup of tea, in this campaign — the battle lines are drawn for and against the BJP. The SP and BSP are only implicitly present in the pro- and anti-BJP arguments.

Arvind Niyogi, bhajan singer, says: “Aap jamoora bana diye, jaadugar ban kar (you posed as the magician, made us your gullible sidekick).” And: “Jamooron ko fakr bhi hua, ki ham jamoora bane (we even took pride in our own gullibility).” When Modi first came to Varanasi in 2014, he stood in line with rose petals to welcome him, but not anymore, he says. K K Shukla, a retired police inspector counters, sarcastically: “As if there was Ram Rajya before this…”

As the battlelines stretch tight in the tea shop and outside it, in his small baithak in Ayodhya, Ram Shankar Tripathi, former professor of Hindi and a writer of books, remembers Ram Rajya as an idea that was less bitter, less contested.

An Ayodhya that was not the centrepiece of political war, but a “sanskritik chetna (a cultural awareness)”. Ayodhya, he points out, literally means “jahan yudh na ho (where there is no war)”.

From Ayodhya to Varanasi, whoever wins this election, whoever loses it, that meaning seems lost irretrievably.