Brahmin politics simmers in UP as parties vie for their support
The situation came to the fore days after senior SP functionary and leader of opposition in UP assembly, Mata Prasad Pandey, accused the BJP of "insulting the Brahmin community".
Now, the focus is on BJP's next move to counter the charge.
Pandey, a Brahmin, ratcheted up the recent incident in which UP minister of state for women and child welfare, Pratibha Shukla, staged a dharna on July 24-25 at Akbarpur police station, accusing cops of targeting her aides. Her husband and former MP, Anil Shukla Warsi, who was present at the dharna, claimed that Brahmins were being unfairly targeted. He even called up deputy CM Brajesh Pathak, urging him to intervene in the case and protect the "interests of Brahmins".
The SP functionary's accusation that the BJP has insulted Brahmins is seen as an attempt to breach BJP's upper-caste vote bank, especially Brahmins.
BJP sources said the party may seek to neutralise the opposition charge by hefting a Brahmin face at a prominent position within the organisation in UP or the Centre in a bid to consolidate its position among the upper caste, which has been traditionally supportive of the saffron outfit since the peak of the Ram temple movement in the early 1990s.
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This, experts said, may help the BJP send a reassuring message to the community besides undercutting the SP's narrative that the BJP was getting overly focused on non-dominant OBCs at the cost of Brahmin representation. SP ally Congress too has been seeking to firm up its presence among the Brahmins since the 2024 Lok Sabha elections when it appointed senior party leader Avinash Pandey as in charge of UP.
BJP has been elevating Brahmins at prominent positions.
The foremost example was the appointment of Brajesh Pathak as deputy CM in the UP cabinet. Pathak replaced Dinesh Sharma, who held the position during the first tenure of chief minister Yogi Adityanath. Sharma is now a Rajya Sabha MP and one of the contenders for the post of UP BJP chief. Another Brahmin face who is eyeing the top organisational job is former Basti MP and current party in charge for Assam, Harish Dwivedi.
In the UP BJP organisational structure, two vice-presidents — Vijay Bahadur Pathak and Triyambak Tripathi — and one general secretary — Govind Narayan Shukla — are Brahmins.
A BJP functionary said the party certainly looked to consolidate its support among the Brahmins. Experts underscored how the social engineering comprising Brahmins swung the political fortunes of BSP chief Mayawati, who got an absolute majority for the first time in 2007. The community is also said to have supported SP in 2012 before shifting back to BJP in 2017.
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