Understanding Uttar Pradesh Elections In A Little More Detail
When Mulayam Singh Yadav announced the termination of his son, Akhilesh Yadav, for 5-years from the party, the family feud was out in the open. And what followed next was the demonstration of power to become the next “Netaji” of the party.
With the first phase of elections on the horizon in Uttar Pradesh, every party is busy making their strategy to get hold of that power seat.
This time, Uttar Pradesh elections are strategically most complexed polls the history will ever witness. Samajwadi Party, which has been sailing in rough tide for the last 2 months, Akhilesh Yadav had a tough time setting-things-up again. From making up his annoyed father to look out for a new alliance, everything falls short for him.
Akhilesh Yadav, who was in turmoil when his father showed him the exit gate of the party, was soon seen to find new ways to claim what it’s his inheriting right, the party command. Soon, the Samajwadi Party has seen the two centres of powers.
With Akhilesh entry as a party chief in Samajwadi Party, creates a rift between the father and son, what followed next was the cold-war, not by directly attacking each other, but by gestures.
Netaji’s distances himself from the party campaigning in Uttar Pradesh is another one of the problems for Akhilesh Yadav. Netaji association with the party for decades had served the foundation on which Akhilesh Yadav is standing today. Netaji’s discontent with the new chief is expected, but without Netaji’s blessing, the young prince of Uttar Pradesh will have a really hard time to sail through the storm.
Akhilesh, who projected himself as the man of development, soon realised this alone won’t help him to come into power again. Meanwhile, Netaji’s U-turn on not supporting any of the campaigns for Akhilesh Yadav is not to be taken as much surprise. The saying, “Nothing is permanent” is the thumb rule in the politics, that’s why the two most rival in Bihar, Nitish and Lalu shaken hands, and a similar situation was seen in Uttar Pradesh as well, Rahul Gandhi-Akhilesh Pact. This pact is seen to wash off the “Modi wave” in the state.
The other challenge that Akhilesh would face in the elections is to keep their voters intact i.e Muslim vote. The Muslim vote in the state accounts for 19%, minus the polarisation of votes. Which is enough to make any party to sit on the thrones of Uttar Pradesh,
The Bhartiya Janata Party
BJP is fighting battles in itself, 10 times more than what Samajwadi Party. From the distribution of tickets to outsiders to the party’s workers conduct on the decision, these all things are coming out from time to time.
For instance, a news printed in The Indian Express, recently when Rita Bahuguna Joshi, who was a prominent face in congress, joins BJP last year, was declined by the Kshetra Pracharak of eastern UP Shiv Narayan, when she visited the RSS office in Lucknow.
The other thing which BJP is fighting is not having a prominent Chief Ministerial Candidate for the state. Not having announced any chief minister face, and the on-going discontent within the party members and the workers will make it hard for the party to make it hard for the party to have an easy boat ride.
Another instance where BJP is struggling hard is disgruntled party’s workers on the distribution of tickets to the outsiders, Swamy Prasad Maurya, for instance, is on party worker’s line of fire. The party worker, for a long time, has been registering their discontent against the party’s decision on giving preference to outsiders. As a major portion of the BJP’s candidate list has been made by the outsiders, and being a sitting MLA makes an easy choice for the party.
BY: Ananya Pandit