UP: Rahul pushes development plank

[1]

Supporters dance during UP chief minister and BSP supremo Mayawati’s election rally in Azamgarh on Tuesday. More than 1.70 lakh

After seven years of sustained efforts and three-and-a-half months of hectic campaigning, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi has finally turned development into a major poll issue in Uttar Pradesh.
Mr Rahul Gandhi has broken the caste mould that held Uttar Pradesh captive for almost 22 years, luring the voters from casteism to sub-casteism.
For the first time in 22 years, all major political parties in the state have started veering towards the issue of development.
It was Mr Gandhi who hammered on development — or rather, the lack of it — in UP even as other parties tried to rake up other issues. He targeted the Opposition on the development agenda and did not allow the attention to be diverted to other issues. If he spoke of corruption, it was also in the context of development.
As a result, all other parties have been gradually pushed towards the development plank.
Even the BJP, barring one or two instances, has not spoken of Ram temple in these elections. Its focus has been on development. The party is promising a clean and corruption-free government and cries of “Mandir wahin banayenge” are no longer reverberate in their meetings.
The Samajwadi Party, along with its attacks on the BSP government, has also been talking of development and promises an all-inclusive growth of the state. In the speeches of SP leaders, there are no hints of casteism, no talks of Yadav unity and the party has almost abandoned its opposition to quota within quota.
Incidentally, the BJP and the Samajwadi Party did try to communalise the atmosphere in UP for their respective gains when the BJP spoke of Ram temple and Mr Mulayam Singh got Syed Ahmad Bukhari to pledge his support to the party.
However, both the parties were quick to realise that the communal card was not working and could even boomerang. Both have now reverted back to development talk.
Meanwhile, the BSP, which is being hit the worst with Mr Gandhi’s crusade against corruption, is happily blaming the Congress for stalling development in the state. The party leadership no longer talks of caste and sub-caste, but dwells at length the issue of development.
Earlier, till not so long ago, the BSP used dalit empowerment as a major poll issue and even after it adopted the “Sarvjan” concept, it continued to bank on social harmony.
This time, it is a different story altogether.
“There is no doubt that Rahul Gandhi has single-handedly broken the caste mould. More than the parties, it is the voters who are talking abut the need for development. The Congress may or may not be able to get the advantage of this in elections but it does get he credit for pushing communalism on to the backburner,” says political analyst and senior journalist V.K. Sharma.