Samajwadi Party

In the Lok Sabha elections of 2019 in Uttar Pradesh, the contest was keenly watched as the alliance of the Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party, and Rashtriya Lok Dal took on the challenge against the domination of the Bharatiya Janata Party. What contributed to the continued good performance of the BJP and the inability of the alliance to assert its presence is the focus of analysis here.

There is a widely held belief that Muslims in India vote en bloc and strategically to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party. This misconception has given rise to several wild theories about how Muslims participate in electoral arena—that they vote in large numbers, their decision of whom to vote for is influenced by clerics, they are more concerned about religious issues while voting, and are less supportive of India’s political institutions. This article presents a body of evidence using public opinion and election returns data from Uttar Pradesh to show that the political and electoral behaviour of Muslims is no different from that of any other major community in the state.

Just ahead of the assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh in early 2017, this is an analysis of the identity politics that is scripting a new political paradigm in the state, undermining the focus of political parties on ideology and social justice, and transforming the Samajwadi Party, which once stood for secularism and inclusion, into a caste-based, criminalised organisation.

A Congress-SP alliance may signal a new era in UP politics. Much depends however on how serious the Congress is about its recent overtures to Mulayam Singh.

The gravest danger to the country's polity todate has been drowned in legalities and rhetorical cleverness. This is what happens when the defence of the secular polity is not understood primarily as a function of people's movements and struggles.