Row over UGC fairness rules offers BJP, Mayawati a lot to ponder in Uttar Pradesh

An informal observer of statements popping out of Uttar Pradesh, can’t be blamed for assuming for a minute that he/she could have stepped again into the early 2000s.

On the one facet you will have Bahujan Samaj Celebration (BSP) chief Mayawati, endorsing the Supreme court docket’s keep on the College Grants Fee (UGC) rules on fairness, saying the foundations would stoke social rigidity, reflecting normal class anxieties, on the opposite was former Union minister Kalraj Mishra, breaking cowl after retiring from a gubernatorial stint in Rajasthan, once more talking out on the UGC concern.

With regard to Ms Mayawati, her statements, first on the UGC rules on fairness and afterward the title (Ghooskhor Pandat, or Corrupt pandat) of a brand new webseries is paying homage to her “sarv samaj” push of the mid 2000s, when she received a full majority within the Uttar Pradesh Meeting. It’s being seen as a bid to return to a playbook that had labored for her prior to now, the place, she went from being a Bahujan Samaj (Dalit) chief to a Sarv Samaj (a frontrunner of all communities) one. This follows years of rising political marginalisation typically accompanied by authorized stresses, the emergence of the BJP because the dominant get together in Uttar Pradesh, with its salami slicing of the Different Backward Courses (OBC) vote, with non Yadav OBCs, and of the Dalit assist base, by way of non Jatav votes. This marginalization has grown to such an extent that come November 2026, the BSP’s lone MP, Rajya Sabha member Ramji Gautam’s retirement will imply that the get together won’t have any presence in both Home of parliament. The explanations for this decline, other than these talked about above are many, however what is critical is what’s revealed by Ms Mayawati’s makes an attempt to return to her “sarv samaj”.

It says extra concerning the BJP and its inner dynamics within the run as much as the Meeting polls in 2027, than the BSP. The UGC rules on fairness raised the hackles of the final class courses, the core assist base of the BJP for a few years now. Inside that class, Brahmins, thought of 10%-12% of the citizens are notably aggrieved with the Yogi Adityanath authorities, there being a notion, that the chief minister’s caste id of being a Thakur is affecting state patronage within the state. A cocktail party of Brahmin legislators in December final 12 months through the sitting of the State Meeting introduced these lengthy held anxieties of the Brahmin neighborhood to the fore. The UGC rules had been thought of the final straw and there have been sturdy protests by normal class college students over the matter. 

At this level, former Governor Kalraj Mishra, thought of retired from lively political life, entered the fray and gave phrases to the voices throughout the BJP and within the bigger Brahmin neighborhood over the rules. His shock look stated two issues — one which there was a critical concern with regard to the UGC rules throughout the BJP itself, and secondly, that the get together’s cabinet was naked when it got here to Brahmin management.

That not one of the Brahmin leaders now at the moment in electoral politics had the affect and heft to boost the difficulty throughout the get together has change into apparent. Regardless of the presence of BJP Minister Brajesh Pathak and former Mayor of Lucknow Dinesh Sharma, it required Mr Mishra, whose electoral heyday was within the Nineties and early 2000s to talk up. In such a state of affairs, it isn’t any marvel that Ms Mayawati, on the lookout for a comeback is recalling her 2007 playbook.