By Faisal Fareed, TwoCircles.net
In a move that was expected, Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati has given maximum tickets to Muslim in coming UP polls.
As many as 97 Muslims figure in BSP’s list, establishing the fact that Mayawati has gone all out for Dalit-Muslim formidable equation. Even in this scenario, she has reinvented her social engineering formula to Dalit-Muslim-Brahmin combination.
Interestingly, although Muslims constitute nearly 19.26% of UP’s population, they have received nearly 24% tickets. In 2007 polls, the BSP had fielded 61 Muslims and in 2012 she had given tickets to 85 Muslims.
Mayawati also tried to reason out with Muslims in simple manner. “The SP is facing infighting. Both the groups will field candidates. Muslim votes will be divided so to avoid division and defeat of communal forces, vote for BSP unitedly,” she said.
She also claimed that Yadavs are hardly 5%-6% and are influential only on 60-70 seats while Dalits are 22-23 percent and have 50,000 votes in each constituency and at places, it is over one lakh so their combination with Muslims will ensure BSP’s victory. For other castes including upper caste, she claimed that if the candidate is able to get votes from his community, then he can win with the help of Dalit votes. She claimed that it is the strategy to stop BJP.
BSP leaders claimed that their party believed on formula—’Jiski Jitni Sankhya bhari, utni uski hissedari’.
Among other communities, Mayawati has fielded 113 upper caste among which the numbers of Brahmins are 66 (86 in 2007, 74 in 2012), Kshatriya 36 (38 in 2007, 33 in 2012) and others 11 (15 in 2007, 10 in 2012). In 2012, the total figure for upper caste was 117 and 139 in 2012.
Among the OBCs she has given to tickets to 106 candidates. There were 113 and 114 OBC candidates in 2012 and 2007 respectively.
Her ticket distribution to Dalit community, however, remained stable. She has given tickets to 87 Dalits which was 88 in 2012 and 87 in 2007. This is also from the fact that hardly any Dalit candidate is able to win from general seats and they win only from 85 reserved seats.