UP ELECTIONS, 1996

UP Assembly Elections, 1996

UP: Muslim Representation in

Assembly Elections, 1996

Total No. of Seats :                 425

Muslim Population :               16%

Due Representation :              68

Actual No. of MLA’s :                       38

Level of Representation :       56%

UP: Partywise Vote Percentage,1996

BJP Samata                             32.7

SP-UF                                     29.4

BSP-Congress                         27.8

Others                                     10.1

Total                                       100.0

UP: Vote - Religious Break-up (Figures in %)

Religion          BJP      BSP     SP

Hindu              97        87        53

Muslim                        3          13        47

(source: The Week, 6 October, 1996)

UP: Assembly Election Results, 1996

Party                            Seats                            Party                            Seats

BJP                              174                              SP                                110

BSP                             67                                Congress                     33

BKKP                          8                                  JD                                7

CPI-M                         4                                  Congress(T)                4

Samata                         2                                  CPI                              1

Independent & Others 14                                Total                           424

        UP: Pre- election Opinion Poll, 1996

Caste                           BJP      BSP     Cong(I)           S.P & Allies            Cong(T)          Others Un-certain

Brahmins                    80%     –          12%     –          4%       4%                   –

Rajputs                                    79%     –          4%       5%       7%            5%                   –

Yadavs                                    7%       4%       9%       75%     –            5%                   –

Jats                              30%     –          9%       28%     –          7%                   26%

Kurmis                                    37%     27%     8%       26%     –            2%                   –

Lower OBCs               43%     19%     9%       25%     –          4%                   –

Muslims                      –          5%       8%       77%     –          10%                 –

Dalits                          11%     65%     9%       10%     –          5%                   –

(source: The India Today, 31 August, 1996)           

UP Election 1996: Muslim MLAs

S.No                Name                          Constituency

Samajwadi Party:    

1.         Ameer Alam                           Thana Bhawan

2.         Abdul Kalam                          Mahdawal

3.         Taufeeq Ahmad                                  Domaria Ganj

4.         Ateeq Ahmad                         Allahabad West

5.         Afzal Ansari                            Jaunpur City

6.         Babu Khan                              Shahabad

7.         Iqbal Mahmood                                  Sambhal

9.         Saulat Ali                                Moradabad (Rural)

10.       Abul Kalam                            Varanasi (North)

11.       Alam Badi Azmi                     Nizamabad

12.       Haji Mushtaq Ahmad             Arya Nagar

13.       Abeedur Rahman                    Atraula

14.       Dr. Viqar Ahmed                    Bahraich

15.       Sarvar Ali                               Ram Nagar (Barabanki)

16.       Shabbir Ahmed                                   Charda (Bahraich)

17.       Waseem Ahmed                     Gopal Pur

18.       Jamaluddin Siddiqui               Kamal Ganj

19.       Abdul Rasheed Khan              Chanda

20.       Dr. Muslim                             Tilwai

Bahujan Samaj Party:        

21.       Qazi Moinuddin                      Laksar

22.       Anees Ahmed                         Bail Pur

23.       Abdul Mannan                                    Sandila

24.       Akbar Husain                          Kundarki

25.       Qasim Husain                         Jehanabad

26.       Rizwan Zaheer                                    Tulsi Pur

27.       Mukhtar Ahmad Ansari                      Mau

28.       Ghazanfar Ali                         Bijnor

29.       Karim Hasan                           Jehanabad

30.       Farid Mahfooz Kidwai                       Masooli

31.       Bunyad Husain Ansari                        Laharpur

32.       Murad Lari                              Saleempur

Congress:      

33.       Afroz Ali Khan                                   Rampur City

34.       Kazim Ali Khan                      Milak Bilaspur

35.       Dr. Ammar Rizvi                    Mahmoodabad

Bhartiya Kisan Kamgar Party       

36.       Kokab Hameed                                   Baghpat

37.       Parvez Haleem                                    Kithaur

Independent:

38.       Mohd Muqeem                                   Etawa

Smita Gupta

On Muslim Voting in UP

As far as the Muslims are concerned, they will continue to vote for the strongest non-BJP candidate, with the advantage remaining with the UF: for one, the Congress has not been forgiven for not protecting the Babari Masjid; secondly, the Imam of Jama Masjid's fatwa in favour of the BSP has not pleased the community- as recent letters in the Urdu press testify.

(Source: The Times of India, 21 September, 1996)

Performance in UP Elections

BSP

13% of newly-elected BSP MLAs came from upper castes, while 30% belong to other backward castes. Notwithstanding its image of belonging to Scheduled Castes, the BSP fielded 57 upper caste candidates this time of whom nine won. Most of the seats are in the Poorvanchal region.

17% of the BSP MLAs are Muslims this time. The BSP fielded 54 Muslim candidates of whom 12 won. BSP's Muslim candidates captured Bijnor, Kundarki, Bilaspur, Lahapur, Sandila, Masoli, Bhinga, Tulsipur, Salempur, Mau and Jahanabad Assembly seats.

The BSP had fielded a highest of 102 candidates from the other backward classes, 26 whom won. The BSP has only 20 Scheduled Caste MLAs in the new Assembly, the party had fielded 86 candidates.

BJP

The BJP which won the highest number of the reserved constituencies. Once considered as the party of the upper caste, it had given the maximum number of tickets to OBC candidates this time.

Under the process of social engineering launched in 1993 by BJP's second generation leader Govindacharya in order to reverse party's image as a party of upper castes, the party this time fielded more OBC candidates.

The number of BJP's upper caste legislators fell by 12 seats. In the last elections, 97 upper caste candidates had won. This time only 85 upper caste contestants were successful. Among the OBC candidates was fielded this time, 51 won, 11 more than that of the previous elections in 1993.

55% of the BJP MLAs in 1993 belonged to the upper castes. This time, a little over 40% of the BJP MLAs are from upper castes. Very few of BJP's winning candidates from (western UP) belonged to the Jat community. The BJP's fortunes tumbled in western UP because of Mr. Ajit Singh's joining hands with the United Front. The BJP had given ticket to 27 women candidates of whom, only seven managed to win. Of them, four to OBC and only two were from the Dalit community.

SP

The strategy of the Samajwadi Party to expand its support base among the upper castes has worked well in this election. The party has caten into a sizeable chunk of the upper caste votes of the BJP. Of the 110 seats won by the SP, it has wrested 39 from the BJP. The SP has gained a total of 72 new seats

The SP had fielded about 30 Rajputs, out of which 11 have won. Eight of these seats were wrested from the BJP, though the SP had also to lose ten of these 30 seats.

(Source: The Hindustan Times, 15 October, 1996)

Vijay Sharma on Shiv Sena in UP Elections

The Shiv Sena, which is a decisive factor in Maharashtra politics, has yet to create any base in UP despite a full-fledged party organization. It is evident by the fact that 50 of its 51 candidates, who were in the fray in the recently-concluded UP Assembly elections, forfeited their deposits while only one contestant the state Shiv Sena president Pawan Assembly Constituency of Ambedkar Nagar. The Sena Pandey got 43,000 votes to win third place in Akharpur attributed the poor performance to a weak organization making a commitment, refused to spare 25 of the 425 and the false promise of the BJP leaders, who after constituencies the Shiv Sena candidates got more votes assembly seats for the party. State general secretary. than the margin with which the BJP candidates lost Nripendr Pandey disclosed that in at least 30 mainly due to division of pro-Hindu vote bank.

(Source: The Pioneer, 14 October, 1990)

BJP's Reverses in UP

UP was Hindu heartland, UP was Hindi heartland and UP was also the shortest route to Delhi. This explains why the party upped the ante to a do-or-die pitch before immediately invested the party with the moral authority the polls. Had UP fallen into the BJP kitty, it would have to demand that the Deve Gowda government march out of office.

In the event, the verdict has seriously hurt the BJP. Not only has it squandered away the rapid gains it had made since breaking up the alliance between the SP and the BSP. it has suffered reverses across the state, The only region where the party has posted impressive including in its strongholds of eastern and central UP victories is Uttarakhand obviously the voter here was reacting to the Tiwari Congress's alliance with Mulayam Singh Yadav, a symbol of tyranny in this area.

But winning Uttarakhand while being pushed back everywhere else may add to the BJP's troubles. For that will reinforce the growing impression that the party is essentially upper caste, creating further disaffection in its OBC ranks and frustrating the party's attempts to broaden wracking the BJP seems set to worsen in the days to its appeal. Indeed, the identity crisis that is currently come. The BJP needed a morale boosting victory in contain the ambitions of Bal Thackeray in Maharashtra UP... to put down inner-party dissidence in Gujarat and A positive message from UP would have forced fence- other hand, may hasten their migration to Shankersinh sitters in Gujarat to do a rethink. The hung verdict, on the Waghela's party, especially if he looks like forming a running feud with the BJP can also be expected to government there. Thackeray, who has been locked in a throw more temper tantrums.

The party's once reliable fallback, Ayodhya, has run its course and seems unlikely to lend itself to revival. Even if that were possible, the BJP has to keep in mind the impact of returning to this volatile issue on its probable future partners. The regional parties for unc would be chary of any step the BJP takes towards Ayodhya a factor which will reinforce its isolationist status and foreclose its options in Delhi.

(Source: The Times of India, 13 October, 1996)

M.A. Hafiz on BJP Strategy in UP Elections

The fractured electoral verdict in Uttar Pradesh has come as a serious blow to the BJP strategy aimed at capturing power in the State to destabilize the United Front government at the Centre.

"Unless there is a BJP Government at the Centre, the Ram temple at Ayodhya cannot come into being", said Kalyan Singh.

However, the BJP suffered electoral reverses in Faizabad-Ambedkarnagar, except for the lone Ayodhya seat. Of the nine scats, the BJP could win just two including Ayodhya.

In Gonda and Bahraich, the two districts across the Saryu river of the eight seats in Bahraich, it... won only two and of the II seats in Gonda just five. In 1993, the BJP had won seven of the 11 seats in Gonda. Therefore, Ayodhya failed to prove a springboard.

The Hindutva party suffered reverses again in Eastern UP where the United Front and the Cong-BSP candidates offered serious resistance to the BJP. In Sidharthanagar, Deoria, Basti, Padrauna and Azamgarh, the BJP was halted in its tracks by the UF and the Cong-BSP combine.

However, in Uttarakhand comprising of over 90 per cent Brahmin and Rajput voters the BJP flag flutters in 18 Assembly segments.

The BJP suffered in Western UP due to the last-minute entry of BKKU into the electoral fray.

The BJP lost nearly two per cent of its popular votes as compared to the recent Lok Sabha polls when the party had secured 33.43 per cent votes. The party leadership expected to get 38 per cent votes.

The voters also punished some... defectors to the BJP, who had joined the saffron brigade after the collapse of the SP-BSP Government.

Among the United Front constituents, the SP improved its electoral tally by one seat as compared to 1993... while the Janata Dal, which had bagged 27 seats in 1993, was left with just seven.

Veteran leader and president of Congress-T suffered the worst innings of his political career when his outfit failed to win any seat in Uttarakhand while its electoral tally is a dismal four...

The Congress certainly emerged in a better shape after forging an electoral alliance with the BSP. It won 33 seats and most of its stalwarts romped home... due to the 24 per cent Dalit votes.

The BSP did not emerge as a gainer, as it had won 69 seats in 1993 in alliance with the SP.

(Source: The Hindustan Times, 12 October, 1996)

Arati R. Jerath on BJPS Appeal in UP Election

The BJP's poor showing in UP is being attributed in party circles to three main factors-the overt Mandalisation of the party, the lack of an emotive issue to subsume the casteist nature of these elections and the poor selection of candidates.

Although the party was on a favorable wicket given the three-way split in votes, it clearly failed to capitalize on its advantages and enthuse its supporters. This is underlined by the fact that the BJP's vote share is likely to go down a point or two since the 1993 Assembly polls.

Last night, BJP leaders attempted to explain away their failure to win on a low turnout of voters. The figures that came in this morning, however, shot this argument to pieces as they proved that the turnout this time is the highest since 1977. It was even higher than in 1993 when the party won 177 seats-54.6 per cent as against 53.6 per cent in 1993.

Obviously, while its opponents managed to get voters out in their support, the BJP was unable to mobilize additional votes for itself.

Some insiders are already pointing accusing fingers at former Chief Minister Kalyan Singh for his aggressive pro-backward caste stand which is thought to have dampened cadre enthusiasm and prevented the upper caste consolidation for the BJP, expected in the wake of the Congress-BSP alliance. At the same time, it did not yield the desired increase in OBC support.

Party circles feel that the blatant pandering to the backward castes may have lost them 30 to 40 crucial scats which has made all the difference between sitting in the Opposition and forming While both Mulayam Singh and Mayawati can openly appeal for votes on a caste basis, the BJP cannot. It was thus bad politics to try and fight the SP and BSP with its own weapons.

What the BJP should have done was to have identified a single emotive issue which would have put its campaign on different plane altogether as in 1991 when the Ram mandir plank overshadowed the Mandal completely.

The campaign itself is also coming in for severe criticism... There were logistical and administrative failures galore. The planning and execution of the entire campaign this time was left to the State unit at its insistence, resulting in poor coordination between the State and the Central units.

Clearly, the BJP has only itself to blame for its poor performance in UP.

The official reaction was thus muted. "We are satisfied that we have maintained our primacy but we are disappointed that we have not secured a majority", spokesman said.

 (Source: The ???????????, 11 October, 1994)

P.K. Roy

I-On Muslim Apathy in UP Elections, 1996

Notwithstanding assiduous wooing by parties across the political spectrum in UP, the Muslim community has responded with studied indifference as discerned in the two phases of polling held on September 30 and October 3. The first two phases covered as many as 296 constituencies, including most of the 136 seats, where Muslim vote plays a decisive role. The Muslim apathy in the ongoing elections, discerned also in the Lok Sabha poll, may upset political calculations.

The trend was seen in Muslim-dominated constituencies of the State. They came out to vote, but on a lesser scale and for only SP candidates. In constituencies where non-SP United Front parties were in the fray, the response was mulch less, according to reports reaching from districts.

Incidentally, in view of the low turnout in the Lok Sabha poll in May last, the All-India Milli Council had issued an appeal to the community to come out and vote in large numbers. The religious leaders had also made the same appeal. But, the average Muslim voter remained unmoved, unconcerned. The possibility that such a stance might benefit the BJP, did not bestir them as in 1993. A 'who-cares' attitude is discernible

Political observers attribute this to the demolition of the Babari Masjid having lost much of its thrust as an emotive issue. The issue had driven the community to punish the BIP at the hustings. The coming together of the SP and BSP had raised their confidence that the BJP which had won the 1991 poll could be defeated. Their parting of ways has caused dismay and consequent apathy. Many feel that the BJP cannot be stopped from coming to power, as the Lok Sabha poll outcome has demonstrated. The Muslim religious leaders working at cross-purposes issuing fatwas for one or the other line-ups added to the confusion. Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav has lost much of his charisma.

The question being asked is what benefit the community would get by supporting him in real terms. Besides BSP leaders and Shahi Imam Bukhari, Maulana Taufiq Raza Khan Barelvi has accused him of using the Ayodhya issue to bring about a confrontation between the two principal communities. His justifying the Bal Thackeray-Deve Gowda meeting added to the confusion Nevertheless, Mr. Mulayam Singh remains the first choice of the community.

Many Muslim voters (said) that their community like others was more concerned about economic issues, unemployment, drinking water problem, power crisis, sanitation and corruption than emotive issues. There is growing cynicism over the role of politicians of the day, irrespective of their party label. Law and order is another aspect and many Muslims are willing to buy Ms. Mayawati's charge that goondaism and the Mafia gained ascendancy under Mr. Mulayam's rule.

(Source: The Hindu, 5 October, 1996)       

Amit Sharma on Muslim Apathy

For the one group that has remained conspicuous by its virtual non-presence in the polling booths this time is Muslims - the SP's and the BSP's favorite vote-bank This was especially true in areas like Kanpur, Moradabad, Agra, Rampur and Bareilly where the community, by virtue of its strength, has traditionally called the shots. Ironically, the parties may have no one else to blame but themselves. First, the SP and the BSP- who had been allies the last time - parted ways, giving, as Muslims saw it, the BJP a chance to come back to power.

Second, despite reports that Muslims had been hardly taken in by the move, both the SP and the BSP made it a point to have their claims backed by the "right" leaders. If the BSP snatched the support of the Imam of Delhi's Jama Masjid Abdullah Bukhari right from under Mulayam Singh Yadav's nose, the SP had its own Imams backing it.

Mulayam and Kanshi Ram seem to have learnt no lessons from the recent Lok Sabha polls. Even then, the community's disenchantment had been obvious as a majority, stayed away from the polling booths. Another noticeable trend is that this time, Muslims seem to have general, except for a few cases where some non-Muslims rejected candidates belonging to other communities in fielded by the SP got their support.

Mohammed Suleiman of the Indian National League believes there is a reason for the turnaround. "Muslims are now wise enough to smell a rat in the designs of political parties, which use them as a mere vote-bank", he says. "By casting our votes in favor of Muslim candidates, even if they are Independents, we have at least shown loyalty to the community.

(Source: The Indian Express, 6 October, 1996)

II-On Reasons for BJP's Fall

Losing in as many as 92 of the 177 scats won by it in 1993, in the face of a combined challenge of the SP-BSP, mainly contributed to the failure of the saffron party to secure an absolute majority. An over-confident State unit in the face of the gains in the May last Lok Sabha poll, when the BJP bagged as many as 52 of the 85 seats and a lead in as many as 236 segments, frittered away the apparent edge through arbitrary decisions in ticket distribution and apathy to the committed vote-bank, besides very short poll campaign, and shortage of funds.

Uttar Pradesh is the main prop of the BJP scheme of things. A feeling developed that old-timers and the committed vote-bank were being taken for a ride, and they reacted by not actively participating in the campaign.

The BJP while cultivating the OBC and Dalits, in the name of social engineering had taken the upper caste support for granted and inducted new faces of dubious allegiance. And in the name of winnability it tried many controversial faces, from other parties, some joining it a few days before filing nomination. Allegations of favor as a quid pro quo, or caste consideration are being openly lung against influential State leaders and powerful regional organizing secretaries, as never before.

The party should have derived much mileage in 1996 in vertical split in non-BJP votes and indifference among a confused Muslim electorate. The BJP's projections of securing lead in eastern UP did not fructify and so also in central region. The Tikait-Ajit factor did not damage it much. Only the Uttarakhand gave the party more than expected. But that is because, the SP and BSP are no force in the upper caste-dominated region and the Bundelkhand in the south, where the BSP had made its first presence. But, the two with 40 seats cannot compensate for losses in main regions.

(Source: The Hinds, 12 October, 1996)