Praising BJP, attacking SP: What’s Mayawati’s game plan?

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) might have lost its support base steadily in Uttar Pradesh politics, but the shifting strategies of its supremo Mayawati have always been a subject of the curious. Her sly moves have not only caught her opponents and analysts by surprise, but also given an indication to her supporters about the party’s future political course.

With the next Assembly elections due in early 2027, the BSP would be eagerly looking to make a comeback since its last few electoral ventures have failed to deliver the desired results, including the 2024 general elections when it drew a blank.

Mayawati's calculated political twist

Mayawati, a Dalit icon and a four-time chief minister who has not tasted power after 2012, made a significant effort towards that direction earlier this week by organising a major rally to mark the 19th death anniversary of her mentor and the BSP's founder, Kanshi Ram. The BSP supremo's strategy was an interesting one.

On Thursday (October 9), as she addressed supporters at the Manyavar Shri Kanshi Ji Ram Smarak Sthal in Lucknow, she not only termed the state’s BJP government better than the previous government of the Samajwadi Party (SP) but also gave an idea about the plan of action for BSP, which has remained cornered in the state politics for a while.

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When the leadership of the BSP called for the rally, few would have anticipated that Mayawati would, on the occasion, express gratitude to the Yogi Adityanath government while attacking the SP, her arch-rival. But ‘Behenji’, as the BSP supremo is widely known, did it to create a political stir, particularly in the SP and Congress camps, which was bound to have an impact.

Targeting SP, thanking BJP

The former chief minister lashed out at the SP, accusing it of taking little care of memorials and parks named after Dalit heroes and hoarding the revenue from the sale of visitors’ tickets. She praised the current government on this count, saying it had heeded her request to use the ticket money for the maintenance of the memorials, and she was grateful for that. Mayawati also claimed that the ticket system for park maintenance was started when her party was in power.

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What Mayawati said was an attempt to keep her supporters and voters connected to the party. While she praised the state’s BJP government, her voters know very well that the SP either squandered the money received from the memorials that the BSP government built to honour Dalit icons and saints or used it for other purposes. Mayawati only tried to drive home the point that the SP would never respect Dalit heroes or come to the aid of the community.

Not denying 'BJP's B team' tag

The 69-year-old leader also clearly stated that the UP government acknowledged a letter that she had written and used the money received from the sale of tickets to repair memorials. The former CM did not even try to shed before her supporters the ‘BJP’s B team’ tag that has been attached to her party. In a way, she suggested clearly that the BJP government takes better care of memorials dedicated to Dalit figures than the SP.

Ravi Jatav, who came to attend the rally from Aligarh, said, “Behenji said what we all have seen. The SP can never be a well-wisher of the Bahujan. And the maintenance work that the BJP government has done is under pressure from Behenji after she wrote the letter. Despite not being in the government, she still cares about the Bahujan community and wields so much clout.”

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Safeguarding BSP's Dalit base

It has been seen for some time now that Mayawati has refrained from openly attacking both the central and state governments. But her decision to speak out this time is part of a strategy. In UP, the BSP’s main rival remains the SP. The BSP president knows very well that unless the Dalit votes are unified, her party’s chances of returning to power would remain grim.

While the BSP might be talking about “Sarvjan Hitaya” (for the well-being of all), Mayawati’s ‘trump card’ in the election remains the Dalit votes. One of the reasons why she praised the BJP is to prevent the Dalit votes from shifting to the SP under its PDA (Pichhre, Dalit and Alpasankhyak) strategy.

The arithmetic of Dalit votes

The Dalits constitute nearly 20 per cent of UP's population. Of that, approximately 12 per cent belong to the Jatav, and the remaining are non-Jatav. The BSP has a stronghold on the Jatav vote and claims exclusive hold over the Dalit votes. While this base vote of Mayawati’s party has shifted over the years, the SP’s PDA strategy in the last Lok Sabha election dealt a serious blow to the BSP.

Also read: UP ‘poster war’ pits BJP, SP, and Congress leaders in Lucknow

As per data provided by the CSDS, the BSP received 44 per cent of the Jatav votes in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, while the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) got 24 per cent and the SP-Congress alliance 25 per cent. However, Mayawati’s primary setback came from the non-Jatav Dalit voters, as only 15 per cent of them voted for her party. The NDA, on the other hand, secured 29 per cent of the non-Jatav votes.

The SP-Congress alliance managed to bag 56 per cent of the non-Jatav votes, thanks to Akhilesh Yadav’s PDA arithmetic and the alliance’s ‘Constitution change’ narrative against the BJP-led NDA. In the 2022 Assembly elections, Mayawati got a larger share of the same vote base. As a result of the setback, the BSP recorded its worst performance ever, getting zero seats in the general election.

Mayawati's bid for relevance

Political analyst Ratan Mani Lal said, “Given the current situation of the BSP, it is important for Mayawati to show that she is back in the game. To do that, she has no other option but to demonstrate her strength, and she did it by organising a massive gathering. Mayawati wants to portray the BSP as the third front in UP politics. For this, it was necessary to project the SP as its enemy No.1.”

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Lal also said that every leader needs to assert himself or herself from time to time, or else his or her existence would be under threat. “It was important for Mayawati thus to gauge her own position in the current scenario,” he told The Federal.

Divided sentiment over stance

Mayawati’s strategy is to woo the Dalit vote bank by portraying the SP as anti-Bahujan. It was not without reason that she termed the ‘Constitution change’ narrative a “drama”. Santosh Bharti, a youth from Deoria who attended the rally, said, “We understand very well what our leader Behenji says. But the paid media is projecting it as SP bashing. The media are misleading the Dalit voters, and that is why they are even questioning Behenji’s praise for the UP government over the maintenance of monuments.”

However, Rahul Baudhra, who came for the rally from Ambedkar Nagar, did not buy this viewpoint. “I came to listen to Behenji’s speech after a long time. But instead of criticising the government, she was more aggressive against the Opposition parties. While there have been many instances of Dalits getting murdered under this very government, Mayawati did not speak against the government on this issue.”

(The article was first published in The Desh Federal)