Lucknow: The upcoming Rajya Sabha elections may well be shaping up as more than a routine parliamentary selection process for BJP in UP. The nomination process for the upper house, instead, could underscore BJP’s caste strategy in the run-up to the next year’s Assembly elections.
Another prominent Brahmin leader, Dinesh Sharma, vacated his seat on Sept 11 after being appointed as Lieutenant Governor of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, creating an additional opening. Political observers believe BJP’s choices are bound to signal its electoral priorities even as the saffron outfit prepares to counter the opposition’s Pichhda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak (PDA) poll narrative which is said to have dented the party in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Of the seven BJP Rajya Sabha MPs from Uttar Pradesh due to retire in Nov, only one, Seema Dwivedi, belongs to the Brahmin community.
Experts said the OBC-Dalit outreach in RS polls and continued accommodation of upper-caste interests in MLC elections underscore BJP’s central poll strategy in UP. At the centre of calculations is BJP’s continuing effort to consolidate non-Yadav OBCs and non-Jatav Dalits, the two key blocs which are the cornerstone of the party’s electoral strategy. The focus assumes significance at a time when Samajwadi Party and its ally Congress are trying to expand their social coalition and challenge BJP’s dominance. The outgoing members also include two Thakur leaders, Arun Singh and Neeraj Shekhar, while Union minister BL Verma, a Lodh, and Geeta Shakya represent the influential non-Yadav OBC communities. Party sources suggest that the politically influential Lodh community could once again receive attention. The community occupies a special place in BJP’s social coalition, owing largely to the legacy of former chief minister Kalyan Singh, who remains one of the party’s most influential OBC Lodh icons in UP. sustaining that equilibrium has become increasingly important even as the opposition positions itself to consolidate anti-BJP votes While the party’s recent electoral success has been built largely on broad social coalitions that cut across caste lines.