BSP EYES CRUCIAL AZAM SUPPORT

Lucknow: After BSP’s drubbing in UP assembly polls, Mayawati has been toiling to devise an effective strategy for the revival of her party. Along with the overhauling of the organization, the BSP chief is focusing exclusively on the Dalit-Muslim votebase. Azam Khan’s support on social media is considered as a part of Mayawati’s well thought out strategy.

For the past decade, the graph of BSP’s electoral performance has taken the shape of a downward trajectory. In the 2014 general elections, it could not win a single seat. In the 2019 general elections, despite the alliance with the SP, the party’s vote share did not increase but it got five seats. In the year 2017 assembly polls, Mayawati’s party got 19 seats with 22.24 percent vote share. In the recent elections, the performance of BSP has reached its worst level since 1993. With the victory in just one seat, its vote share came down to around thirteen percent. After the results, Mayawati blamed shifting of Muslim voters to the SP for such dismal performance. Now, from the Rajya Sabha to the Legislative Council of the state, there is a serious crisis of maintaining representation for the BSP. Political experts believe that the BSP chief is doing damage control exercises in such odd circumstances. Under which the party organization is being revamped, the work is going on for the return of the leaders who have left the party.

At the same time, special attention is being paid to the Dalit-Muslim combination to increase vote share. In this connection, Shah Alam alias Guddu Jamali, who left the BSP and contested from Owaisi’s party during the elections, has returned to the party. He has also been declared as the BSP candidate for the by-election to Azamgarh parliamentary seat. Munkad Ali has been given the responsibility of Chief Coordinator. Despite all these effortss, the party lacks a prominent Muslim face. Since Azam undoubtedly has a significant influence among the Muslim community in western UP. BSP strategists are assessing that if this political stalwart,whose anger towards SP Chief is clearly reflected, joins their party, then the electoral equations can be balanced in their favor.

This view point is evident from the fact that Mayawati, who had criticized Azam for his derogatory remark against BJP MP Ramadevi 3 years ago, has now come out in former’s support. Mayawati’s attempt to target BJP in support of Azam Khan through a series of tweets is being judged a big game plan for the future.