Congress targeting Brahmin vote that went to BSP, SP

LUCKNOW: Congress's decision to name Sheila Dikshit as party's CM face has brought the spotlight back on the Brahmin vote bank, which Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati has been eyeing.

Mayawati has been consistently wooing Brahmins since 2007, when her social engineering formula helped her storm to power with absolute majority. Even in 2014 Lok Sabha elections, she relied heavily on the community by giving 21 out of 80 tickets to Brahmin candidates.

Sources said this time too, Mayawati plans to play the Brahmin card to offset a potential loss of Dalit votes in the wake of a surging BJP and could give tickets to more than 80 Brahmin candidates.

Comprising 11% of the total vote bank, Brahmins had traditionally sided with Congress until Mandal and Ram mandir movement made the community move to the BJP camp. However, BJP's Brahmin vote share has been decreasing progressively since 2002 when it got 50% of the total votes of the community , political experts said.

It dipped to 44% in 2007 and to 38% in 2012. Samajwadi Party won the 2012 election getting 19% of Brahmin votes while BSP got another 19%. Experts claim it is this shift of Brahmin vote that Congress is eyeing. In 2009 Lok Sabha polls, when Congress won 21 seats, the party managed to get sizeable Brahmin support.

Political commentator J P Shukla said Congress bringing in a Brahmin face may just be a case of 'tokenism'. "UP's political scenario changed dramatically after 1989 when no Brahmin leader could become a chief minister (Narayan Dutt Tiwari of Congress was the last Brahmin CM of UP)," he said, adding that Congress could not associate itself with any caste or community after the rise of Mulayam and Mayawati whose politics is centred around OBCs and Dalits, respectively . "Congress has thus pinned its hope now on Brahmins," said Shukla, adding that it is not Brahmins but Dalits at the core of Mayawati's political strategy . "Yet, she brings in Brahmin to top up her vote share," he said.

Emphasising that Brahmins are getting associated with Mayawati, BSP state president Ram Achal Rajbhar said: "It is an intellectual class which understands and believes in the rule of BSP."

UP Congress Committee spokesperson Dwijendra Tripathi said all political parties, including BSP, have been using Brahmins as just a vote bank. "It is now time for Brahmins to get their real place in state politics," he said.