Amid upper-caste backlash, BJP to puzzle over getting its equations right

Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, September 7

With backlash from ‘swaran jatis’—upper castes—threatening to disturb its carefully crafted caste calculations, resolving caste equations appears to be top on BJP's mind as it prepares for its two-day national executive meeting dedicated to former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee beginning Saturday.

Although demonetisation, the falling rupee and rising fuel prices are all among the issues troubling the party, it’s the upheaval in India’s caste cauldron that is threatening to create new problems for it in the run-up to 2019. The BJP-led Centre’s attempt to placate numerically important SC-ST block through an amendment that nullified a Supreme Court judgment "diluting" the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989 has mobilised upper caste organisations in several parts 

Meanwhile, demands of reservation for the Patidar community in education and jobs as well as farm loan waivers in Gujarat are finding echo from other parts as well. Hardik Patel's fast has become a rallying point for political parties opposed to the BJP while “C2 + 50” MSP deal by the Centre—which Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP are projecting as their pro-farmers’ moves—has upset farmers’ organisations taking to the streets.

As it braces to face the Lok Sabha and assembly polls, expectedly in five states now with Telengana advancing elections, the two-day BJP meeting at the BR Ambedkar International Centre is expected to draw a blueprint of how the party can reach out to Dalits and backward castes while keeping upper caste vote base happy. BJP’s poll-preparedness in existing strongholds along with expansion in newer territories are expected to be among other points of discussion

Sources say both Prime Minister Modi and party president Amit Shah have expressed concern about unhappiness in upper castes at a recent meeting with BJP chief ministers and attempts by Congress president Rahul Gandhi to woo them. Meanwhile, the choice of venue—BR Ambedkar International Centre—is also significant.

While the BJP is expected to hail the decisions for backward classes—restoration of original provisions of the SC/ST Act and Constitutional backing to the National Commission for Backward Classes—it remains to be seen how the party now placates the upper castes, its core vote bank.