New Delhi, January 2
There is almost a desperation in the Congress to firm up an electoral alliance in Uttar Pradesh as it realises the crucial role this state will play in determining the outcome of the coming Lok Sabha poll.
Realising the party’s weakness in this crucial state, Congress President Sonia Gandhi made a beginning in the direction of alliance-making when she contacted Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader Mayawati on Wednesday.
It is early days yet and still not certain whether it will finally succeed in having a pact with the BSP, but the Congress is busy preparing to market itself as a viable partner to a potential ally.
When the negotiations eventually get under way, Congress strategists will try to convince the alliance partner that though it has a six per cent vote share at present, this can be stretched to 16 per cent.
“While other political parties have reached a saturation point, the Congress is the only party in UP which has the maximum elasticity of its vote,” explained a senior Congress leader, adding that it is this fact that their potential allies have to understand.
As of now, the Congress is a negligible force in UP with its vote share having plummeted to a mere six per cent. Its only solace is that the Congress and the BJP are fighting for the bottom slots in UP.
“Uttar Pradesh is the key in the next general election and for UP, some strategic alliance is the key for the Congress,” remarked a senior UP Congress leader. In fact, Congress strategists believe that, as of now, UP is up for grabs with no single party having a significant
enough vote to win an election single-handedly. In this situation, the outcome of the election will depend on the alliances that a political party is able to forge.
A section of the Congress advocating an alliance with the BSP as opposed to the Samajwadi Party (SP) is arguing that this partnership does not go against the ethos of the Congress party. The Congress has historically been seen as a pro-poor party with the scheduled castes once constituting a major chunk of its support base.
“An alliance with the SP, on the other hand, is against the Congress party's ethos as the OBCs have never voted for us,” explained a Congress strategist.
The pro-BSP lobby further argues that going with Mayawati will not necessarily alienate the upper castes as it happened in case of the BJP. “The BJP in Uttar Pradesh was seen as an exclusively upper caste party. Subsequently, when it went in for social engineering, it ended up annoying the upper castes,” said another Congress leader. But an upper caste-Dalit alliance comes more naturally to the Congress and is far more acceptable under the Congress umbrella which has a history of accommodating these sections.
The other area of concern for the the Congress is the retrieval of the Muslim vote, which had traditionally supported it but has shifted allegiance to the Samajwadi Party and, to some extent, even to the BSP. The Muslims in UP determine the outcome of an election given their 16 per vote share. Here again, the Congress think tank believes the Muslims are gravitating towards their party but the final outcome will depend on the strategic alliance that the Congress is able to put together in UP.
