Why BJP again needs the help of Behenji in Uttar Pradesh and why Mayawati is willing to take the bait

After Chirag Paswan in Bihar spilled the beans about his nexus with the BJP, in Uttar Pradesh it was the turn of Mayawati to make the public admission. Curiously, both developments have put the Bharatiya Janata Party on the back foot.

At the very least, Mayawati exposed BJP's realisation that it is on a sticky wicket in Uttar Pradesh and will need to tie up with BSP if it has to put up a fight. There is wild speculation that the deal is to make Mayawati the next President and her nephew a Deputy Chief Minister if the BJP is able to form a government in UP with BSP's help.

There were early indications of the proposed alliance in the Rajya Sabha election when BJP showed its willingness to accommodate BSP. BJP had enough votes to ensure the victory of eight of its candidates and had surplus votes to spare, which it offered to the BSP to fill up one of the remaining two vacancies.

BJP has 304 lawmakers in the 404-member UP legislative assembly, SP 48 MLAs, and the BSP 18 MLAs.

In the biennial election to the Rajya Sabha in 2018 also the BJP had faced a similar predicament. But it had then fielded a ninth candidate and ensured his victory through preferential votes.  In that election BSP candidate, Bhimrao Ambedkar had lost, despite the combined support of both the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress. Ambedkar had lost because of the cross-voting by the BSP lawmakers and the BJP’s successful bid to win over the support of the independent legislators.

The question is – what prevented the BJP to show that aggression this time. Why does it prefer to play safe?

The answer is: the party leadership could not muster enough courage to go for aggression because of revolt building within the party. Of late, some of the legislators have come out openly against the party leadership. They minced no words in calling the Yogi government one of the most corrupt governments in the history of Uttar Pradesh. Some BJP lawmakers even called the present political dispensation a casteist. They alleged Uttar Pradesh police were persecuting people of other castes, other than Thakurs because the Chief Minister belonged to Thakur caste.

Insiders in the BJP vouch that Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s administration has lost the sheen because of mishandling of the gangrape at Hathras and increase in caste violence particularly against Dalits. Inept handling of the pandemic has left millions of people jobless. Reports even suggest that farmers were forced to commit suicide in Bundelkhand because of mounting debt from the private money lenders.

BJP think tanks believe that a loss of its candidate in the Rajya Sabha election could jeopardize its assembly prospects and therefore played safe.

Amid this growing resentment, the truth has dawned on the BJP leaders that this time going will be tough in assembly elections and therefore they opted for support from other parties. This defensive strategy of the BJP forced them to go for a secret deal with the BSP.

Justifying the party's decision to field 8 candidates in the Rajya Sabha elections senior BJP leader and party’s vice-president Vijay Bahadur Pathak said that people are comparing BJP’s strategy of 2018 with this year’s Rajya Sabha elections.

“This comparison is wrong. Last time we had six more legislators and had an alliance with Om Prakash Rajbhar’s party. Practically we are short of 10 MLAs this time. We knew we could easily ensure the victory of 8 MPs so we have fielded only 8 people,” he said.