UP government may place OBC sub-quota before assembly in budget session

New Delhi: The Uttar Pradesh government may place the Other Backward Classes (OBC) sub-categorisation report before the state assembly in the upcoming budget session to signal its intention to split the 27% OBC quota in an attempt to counter the recently announced SP-BSP alliance for the general election.

“Implementation of this report will be the most solid reply to the SP-BSP alliance. We should do it immediately,” UP’s backward classes welfare minister Om Prakash Rajbhar, who had commissioned the report, told ET.

He said the move was described to him earlier by BJP president Amit Shah as “brahmastra (unassailable weapon)” and that the report was with Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath for more than two months.


“We are in agreement in principle with this report. This idea is the BJP brainchild since the days of Rajnath Singh as CM. Its political impact is being assessed. The CM has to approve the report and then it may be placed before the state assembly in the upcoming session,” said a senior BJP leader, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Another BJP leader, however, said the report poses a dilemma to the party since it can work both ways. It advocates splitting the existing 27% OBC quota three ways – 7% for backward, 11% for more backward and 9% for most backward. It will hurt the Yadavs, who corner most of the OBC quota in the state.

“It will be happy news for non-Yadav OBCs who voted for the BJP in a big way in the 2017 assembly election and could again consolidate behind the party in the Lok Sabha election. But it will upset the Kurmi and Lodh voters who are also the BJP’s strong vote bank,” said the BJP leader.

BJP ally Apna Dal and its MP Anupriya Patel have objected to implementation of the report without a caste census being published first.