BSP candidates may put spanner in BJP's prospects in tough Western Uttar Pradesh race

Lucknow: It is the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and not its arch rival Samajwadi Party (SP), which may spoil BJP's electoral game plan aimed at making a clean sweep in Uttar Pradesh in the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in the constituencies going to the polls in the first phase of polling on April 19.

BSP, which is often labelled as the 'B Team' of the BJP by the SP, has, in a calculated electoral strategy with a view to win and not merely make the contest triangular, distributed its tickets keeping an eye on the caste arithmetic on at least five of the eight LS seats where polling will be held in the first phase of the elections.

The Lok Sabha seats in UP going to the polls in the first phase include: Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, Bijnore, Kairana, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Gautam Budh Nagar and Saharanpur.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, BJP had won seven of these seats and had lost only Bijnore to the BSP, which had then contested the elections in alliance with the SP.

Interestingly, Muslims holds a sizable presence in at least six constituencies out of the eight seats that will go to the polls in the first phase. Both SP and BSP had fielded Muslim candidates from these seats in the past.

This time, however, the BSP has chosen not only to field non-Muslim candidates from five of these seats, which included Kairana, Baghpat, Bijnore, Meerut and Muzaffarnagar, but also kept the seat-wise caste arithmetics in mind while selecting its nominees which may play spoilsport in BJP's plan.

Incidentally the SP, barring the Kairana seat, has also fielded non-Muslim candidates on the remaining four seats.

In Muzaffarnagar, where the Muslims formed around 30 per cent of the electorate, the BSP has fielded Dara Singh Prajapati, an OBC hoping to corner the votes of his community as well as the party's traditional Dalit community, which too was in good strength there.

Prajapati may make the going tough for BJP's Sanjeev Baliyan, if the former manages to get the support of the OBCs. 

In Bijnore seat, where Muslims form around 40 per cent of the electorate, the BSP has fielded Bijender Singh, a 'Jat'. Since the RLD, which is BJP's alliance partner, has fielded Chandan Chauhan, a 'Gujjar', Singh is expected to bag a sizable number of Jat votes damaging the prospects of the BJP.

Similarly, in Meerut, the BSP has Deovrat Tyagi, a Brahmin' against BJP's Arun Govil, who played Lord Rama in the serial 'Ramayana'. The BSP nominee was expected to get the support of around 50 thousand 'Tyagi' voters in Meerut, which could hit the saffron party's prospects.

In Baghpat also, where the Muslims form around 26 per cent of the electorate, the BSP has fielded Praveen Bansal, who hailed from the 'Bania' community, which had BJP's traditional voters.  

In Kairana also, the BSP has fielded Shripal Singh Rana, who hails from 'Thakur' community. BJP's prospects may be hit here if Rana manages to get the support of his community voters.