Mixed feelings about the BSP

in Rewa

DEEP blue posters of Mayawati and Kanshi Ram smiling among a row of leaders including B.R. Ambedkar, Jyotiba Phule and Birsa Munda are all over Rewa. At the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) office, the mood is upbeat. Says Deven Patel, a party worker: "This will be the first time that the BSP will open its account in the Lok Sabha elections in Madhya Pradesh. We have won the Mauganj Assembly seat and finished second in most of the other Assembly seats from Rewa and our support base has grown steadily."

According to the 1991 Census, the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes together formed more than 37 per cent of Madhya Pradesh's population. It is not surprising then that the BSP has gradually made inroads into the State, especially in the districts that border Uttar Pradesh. The BSP, which does not hold any Lok Sabha seats from Madhya Pradesh, is contesting 28 of the 29 seats in the State. Apart from Rewa, the constituencies where the BSP is expected to perform well are Satna, Sidhi, Shahdol, Morena, Gwalior and Bhind.

"For us the most important concern is that our houses will be submerged when the river floods. We live in temporary structures that will be washed away. We need the government to build pucca houses for us," says Lale Kaul, an agricultural labourer and living in Nipaniya Mohalla, a colony in Rewa inhabited mostly by Dalits and Adivasis. Bhanvandin Kaul, who also resides here, adds: "The Digvijay Singh government had initiated schemes whereby we were given titles to our land but the present government has discontinued this. After the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government won the Assembly elections, not a soul has come this way. Many of us will vote for the BSP this time, as Mayawati will work for the Dalit people."

Not everyone is impressed with the BSP though. Says a government official who resides in this colony, "This is Uma Bharati's election. The Congress failed to do anything and we have to see what the BJP does in the next five years." Phulmani Kewat, who is with the Samajwadi Jan Parishad, a grassroots organisation that works with Dalits and Adivasis and is contesting the elections in Rewa, adds: "Corruption is a big issue here. Even government schemes and subsidies never reach the poor. Will the BSP address these issues? It is no different from the Congress and the BJP in this respect. But people in this locality will vote for the BSP as they want a change."

The majority of Dalits in Rewa are landless agricultural labourers. Most land belongs to Thakurs, which the Dalits work on. In January 2002, the Digvijay Singh government convened a meeting of Dalit intellectuals, activists and professionals in Bhopal. The Bhopal Declaration, which resulted from the meeting, focussed on the need to ensure that each Dalit family had enough cultivable land for socio-economic well-being, and legislation is enacted to enforce the right of agricultural labourers to living wages and job security. The document highlighted the need to identify Depressed Class lands to assess the quantum of compensation to be paid by non-Dalits for their illegal utilisation of these lands and to identify the original owners and their families to restore these lands to them.

As part of his Dalit policy, Digvijay Singh announced that the government would redistribute around eight lakh acres of land (3.2 lakh hectares) to Dalits. He said that 30 per cent of all government contracts would be given to Dalits. These measures, he said, would enable them to get a foothold in the State's economy. He also said that the government would fund Dalit students to do doctoral research in the United States and that special centres of excellence for Dalits would be set up in every district of Madhya Pradesh, where students would have access to free food, uniforms, computers and tutors.

But the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) resisted the move to redistribute grazing land. Of the 48 cases of serious clashes that reportedly took place, the OBCs were involved in 46 and the Rajputs in two. The Indore Bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court stayed the move and soon the land was taken back illegally. The pro-Dalit image of the Congress government led to a backlash from the OBC community in the Assembly elections. Even among Dalits, support for the Congress fell. Badly implemented schemes and very little protection against the OBC backlash saw the percentage of Dalits voting for the Congress fall from 37.6 per cent in the 1998 Assembly elections to 31.4 per cent in the 2003 Assembly elections (according to an exit poll by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies). Now more than two years after the Declaration was framed, these are issues that are not a priority for any of the mainstream parties, including the BSP.

THE BJP, the Congress(I) and the BSP are locked in a triangular contest in Rewa. The Congress(I) has fielded the sitting candidate, Sunder Lal Tiwari, and the BJP has fielded Chandramani Tripathi. Since both of them are Brahmins, in a constituency where the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes form over 27 per cent of the population, the BSP is expecting to benefit from the division of votes among the upper castes. The party hopes to consolidate its appeal among the Backward Castes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. In the last Lok Sabha elections the BSP's Ramalallah Singh Patel finished second but won 28.5 per cent of the votes. This time too, the BSP has fielded an OBC, Pradeep Patel, and is expected to improve on its performance.

Says Shailendra Srivastav, general secretary of the BSP's Madhya Pradesh unit, "Congress rule in the State has led to a state where there are no roads and electricity. The BJP said it would solve these problems in 100 days but has not done anything. People are unhappy with both parties and will vote for the BSP." He adds, "Those who work as agricultural labourers on land should have the right to own that land and the government has to redistribute land to the landless. If we come to power, we will follow the example of Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh and implement policies that are practically possible."

Going by the BSP's campaign, it is unlikely that Dalits in Rewa will see any substantive change even if they elect a BSP candidate to the Lok Sabha for the first time in Madhya Pradesh. Says Chandra Bhan Prasad, a Dalit activist who writes a column in the Pioneer and is the only Dalit columnist in the English language press: "There are 121 Lok Sabha constituencies that are reserved for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes. Though technically Dalits are represented in the political arena, since Dalits are in a minority in most constituencies those who are seen as least radical are most likely to get elected. Therefore, Dalits who stand for elections are not politically assertive and once elected cannot really do much." Though a strong performance by the BSP in Madhya Pradesh will strengthen its role in deciding who will rule at the Centre, it is unlikely that this will lead to any substantive change in the lives of Dalits, who form a major chunk of the BSP's vote base, in this region.

With exit polls saying that a hung Parliament is likely, it has become important for the BJP to improve its performance in Madhya Pradesh. The scope for improvement is limited as it already has 21 of the 29 seats from the State. Even Uma Bharati's ill health has not halted the BJP's electoral campaign, which is in full flow. The campaign has been revolving around Vajpayee, with the BJP's State unit even releasing a collection of songs titled `Bharat Uday Atal Vijay'. Though publicly party leaders say they are aiming to win all 29 seats in the State this time, it will be difficult for them to defeat the Congress in constituencies such as Guna and Chhindwada, where that party has put up strong candidates.

The Congress, realising how important it is to retain its seats in Madhya Pradesh, is getting its act together. Senior leaders like Digvijay Singh and Arjun Singh have been campaigning aggressively in the State. But a major cause for worry for the party is the performance of the smaller parties like the Samajwadi Party, the BSP and the Gondwana Ganatantra Party, all of which are likely to improve their performance this time and cut into the Congress vote share. In fact, Arjun Singh has publicly requested the Samajwadi Party to withdraw its candidates, saying that it would avoid splitting the `secular vote'.