Alliance with BSP is Akali Dal’s gain mainly in perception domain as BJP had more effective support base

 

Alliance with BSP is Akali Dal’s gain mainly in perception domain

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

 

The arrangement to have alliance for the February 2022 Assembly elections in Punjab by the Shiromani Akali Dal with the otherwise non-performing Bahujan Samaj Party after break up with the Bharatiya Janata Party is an issue that has more relevance in the perception domain.

The basic issue for the Akali Dal is whether the new relationship can compensate for the loss resulting from the unexpected parting of ways with the BJP, the alliance that ended up as the longest in recent history between the two divergent parties who also had the history of being adversaries in the context of Sikh struggles to protect the interests of Punjab and the Punjabis. The alliance broke under pressure from the farmers struggle.

It is pertinent to  mention that the BSP has never made even a single electoral gain in Punjab since 1997.

The party  still has some pockets of influence, mainly in the Doaba area of Punjab, although like the Communists, its vote share too has been shrinking. The Communist Party of India had won two seats in Punjab last time in 2002 Assembly elections and the party has contested that election in alliance with the Congress. Both the CPI MLAs later defected to the Congress.

The last time the CP(M) had representation in the Assembly was in 1980. The 1992 election is not being considered here as that was held under the shadow of poll boycott and the AK 47’s of both the militants and the security forces. Some of the candidates  who had won had polled only a few hundred votes.  It was an election designed by the agencies as a tool to  deal a deadly blow to militancy and the result was achieved within a few months.

The basic issue underlying the Akali Dal-BSP alliance is not the number of seats allotted to the BSP or the geographical distribution. Of course, the BSP did not get all those seats in which the party had polled sizeable votes in 2017 and this has raised hackles among the party rank and file.

It would be the gain of the BSP even if the party manages to win even two seats under this alliance. The party would have representation in the Assembly after about quarter of a century. This alliance has to be assessed in this context. The calculations of the party itself are not known at this stage but this is a way of looking at the arrangement from the criteria of electoral gains. The BSP gains.

At the social level, the positioning of Dalits in Punjab is different as compared to the rest of the country due to Sikhism, the religion philosophy that is a social arrangement based upon egalitarianism, humanism and non-discrimination in terms of caste and creed. This has to be seen in the context of the society in the Indian region being vertically fractured history in which the human dignity is the least concern as humans are treated unequal.

 What is intriguing, however, is the choice of the seats allocated to the BSP.

Akalis don’t contest Golden Temple seat:

The most notable seat from altogether a different aspect that has been allocated to the BSP is the Amritsar Central where the Darbar Sahib (Golden Temple) is located. This seat, for decades, has been alternating between the Congress and the BJP for decades. The Akali Dal has never contested this seat at least since 1977 till which election record has been consulted.

This is a seat in which the Sikh population is on the lower side. Even that population has been diluted after the so-called Galliara scheme under the garb of beautification was launched that in effect was designed keeping in view the security concerns during the post-Operation Bluestar period. The areas adjoining the shrine was taken over by the government and the population got displaced.

Rajesh Kumar of the BSP had received just 500 votes from Amritsar Central in 2017 as compared to 51242 votes of Om Parkash Soni who won as the Congress candidate.

Being the seat of the Golden Temple, the Akali Dal should start putting up its own candidate from here as the issue is not just victory or defeat. The gain for the Akali Dal would be in the domain of morality but then that is both different and difficult domain for the ruling classes.

The other seat in Amritsar is Amritsar North where the BSP had received just 486 votes, amongst the lowest for the party in the state. Both these seats were in the BJP quota in alliance with the Akali Dal earlier.

Would BSP compensate Akalis for BJP loss?

The basic issue in electoral domain is whether the BSP would compensate for the loss the Akali Dal has suffered following break up with the BJP.

The  issue is not just the number of votes in each seat the BSP got in 2017 or the aggregate but comparison with the share of the BJP.

In Punjab, the BJP has been the major gainer under alliance with the Akali Dal. The last time when the BJP contested at its own in this state was in 1985 when it had won six seats under a highly polarized situation after Operation Bluestar.

However, the Sangh Parivar has presence in all the major cities and mandi towns. The issue is not that of its role of being representative of the Hindus that this party is not in Punjab as the Congress too has been in that role since 1947. The BJP has more effective presence as compared to BSP.

It is common knowledge that at the level of arithmetic, the BSP does not compensates the Akali Dal for the loss resulting from end of ‘flesh and nail’ arrangement with the BJP.

The gain of the Akali Dal is mainly at the level of perception.

At the pragmatic level, the main gainer could be the BSP.