Mayawati: Too clever by half?
December 8, 2011
Kancha Ilaiah
Kancha Ilaiah is director for the study of Social Exclusion and
Inclusive Policy, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati seems to think that the proposal
to split Uttar Pradesh into four states will help her win the 2012
elections. What she has not realised is that the four-way split will
put the very existence of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the dalit
agenda that she has been carrying on in real danger.
Ms Mayawati's announcement for a four-way split emerged out of two
considerations. First, B.R. Ambedkar himself suggested in the early
1950s that small states would be in the interest of the Scheduled
Castes. He opposed the formation of linguistic states as they were
bound to be relatively big and would have a hegemony of the upper
castes. He presumed that the scheduled castes, in alliance with other
oppressed castes, had more scope to come to power in small states.
Secondly, splitting Uttar Pradesh into four states would mean that the
Opposition in Uttar Pradesh would get divided. With such a division
within the Opposition camp, Ms Mayawati would get the votes of the
groups which are pro-small states along with those of dalits and
Brahmins. But she hasn't understood that the division of a state could
work either way. For instance, if all those who oppose such a division
rally around the Samajwadi Party (SP), which has a diametrically
opposite stand, the possibility of the SP emerging as the single
largest party is very much there.
Though Ms Mayawati exposed the BJP's double standard on the issue of
small states, the Congress is a difficult nut to crack. It has managed
to keeps its position safe on all fronts, and that is why it is
proposing another States Reorganisation Commission. On the first
count, Ambe-dkar's assumption did not prove to be correct because of
certain unpredictable reasons. In no small state have dalits come to
power in India during the last 64 years.
Haryana and Punjab are both very small states where the scheduled
caste population is quite large. According to the 2001 Census, Punjab
has a dalit population of 28.9 per cent and Haryana has 19.3 per cent.
Ms Mayawati's mentor Kanshi Ram, who came from Punjab, realised that
he would not be able to bring dalits to power in Punjab or Haryana.
Though his cycle yatras would have been organised in Punjab or Haryana
much more easily than in a massive state like Uttar Pradesh, he chose
to work in the biggest state of the nation. And it is because the BSP
managed to capture such a massive state that its ideology has impacted
the nation. If Ms Mayawati was the Chief Minister of Haryana or
Punjab, who would have bothered about her?
Assume that Uttar Pradesh is divided into four states and Ms Mayawati
is the Chief Minister of one of the small states and three leaders
from her party are the chief ministers of other states (even with the
present majority that is a difficult proposition). Even then, what
would be her stature, and what would be the impact of the kind of
projects she has undertaken around the dalit agenda on the nation?
Would she build the kind of monuments that she did in a big state like
Uttar Pradesh?
Ms Mayawati's iron grip on the party is based on the political power
that she keeps on using as "master key", as Ambedkar proposed. But she
should know that once a person from her party becomes the chief
minister of even a small state, s/he would become assertive.
The BSP is not a well organised national party to be able to control
and change chief ministers like the Congress or the BJP. The idea that
once Uttar Pradesh is split into four states, Ms Mayawati will move on
to become the Prime Minister of the country is unrealistic. It is not
the number of chief ministers one has that makes one the Prime
Minister, but the number of MPs.
By proposing the division of the state Ms Mayawati has now lost the
chance to rope in the CPM into her national alliance. As is well
known, the CPM is not for small states. The Telugu Desam will not
support the small-state agenda given the contentious discourse around
Telangana. The only friend Ms Mayawati can find with the proposition
of small states is the corrupt regional outfit, Telangana Rashtra
Samiti. But such an ally is a liability, not an asset.
Ms Mayawati has become a symbol of dalit political ideology. Even if
she is the Opposition leader of a big state like Uttar Pradesh and
seriously works to build up the party across the country, it would
help in empowering the dalits more. The innovative and bold course
that she has taken so far proves that she has tremendous common sense.
Though she is not a political thinker like Ambedkar or a master
organiser like Kanshi Ram, Ms Mayawati has proved to be far more
astute in drawing up strategies for electoral battles. In 2007, her
slogan of "Sarvajan Samaj" worked well and she could win the elections
on her own.
But this time she went out of that ideological framework and brought
in an agenda that can cut the ground from under her feet. She must
remember that this time she is facing the Congress with a better
organisational base and political slogans of its own. Even if the BSP
emerges as the single largest party with 150-160 seats, the SP and the
Congress can join hands and see to it that she remains out of power.
Her small states agenda, from all angles, seems to be a trap.
The writer is director, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and
Inclusive Policy, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad
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