The panchayat elections ahead of the crucial UP assembly elections in 2022 are a big challenge for the Samajwadi Party. The opposition party faces an uphill task of retaining its electoral base comprising Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and Most Backward Classes (MBCs). After three consecutive defeats in 2014 Lok Sabha elections, 2017, UP assembly elections and 2019 parliamentary polls in which the Bharatiya Janata Party effectively created deep inroads in the vote bank of the OBCs and MBCs, the panchayat elections pose a big challenge to the Samajwadi Party.
The BJP, seeking to strengthen its political outreach at the grassroots level, has decided to contest the seats in the panchayat bodies The move is seen as the BJP's attempt to consolidate its position in the rural and semi-urban areas ahead of the high stake UP assembly elections due in 2022. The BJP is scaling up rural outreach in a bid to nudge an assertive opposition Samajwadi Party.
Moreover, as in three previous elections in 2014, 2017 and 2019, the BJP is paying special attention to strengthening its hold among the MBCs and other marginalised classes in the backward category. Over 50 per cent of the candidates announced by the BJP for the post of member of district panchayat and kshetra committee are from OBCs. In Unnao, Lucknow, Varanasi and several other districts, an overwhelming number of candidates for the post of district panchayat member are from OBCs.
Aware of the challenge, Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav is touring the state like never before, travelling to nearly 40 districts and all regions of the state, including Bundelkhand, in the last over a month. He has not only left all other top opposition leaders behind in this respect but appears to have outdone himself in spending time on the road.
Yadav's tours now also involved frequent overnight stays in districts. The sequence began with a three-day visit to his Lok Sabha constituency Azamgarh in eastern Uttar Pradesh in December. During these visits, he has addressed cadre training camps, kisan mahapanchayats, public meetings and press conferences. He has also gone to temples, besides Muslim and Buddhist places of worship. From all the districts, Akhilesh has posted his pictures with dense crowds on his social media accounts. Most of them were road trips but he did use an aeroplane on a couple of visits, including one to Chitrakoot.
In Etawah, he addressed a gathering from atop a tractor. He also stood on the roof of his rath (a luxury election campaign bus) at his Aligarh kisan mahapanchayat. In Rampur, he not only flagged off the 350-km-long Samajwadi Cycle Yatra to Lucknow, but also pedalled the first 10 km of the route along with party workers. He even travelled on a UP Roadways bus on the way to Etawah.
Samajwadi Party spokesman Rajendra Chaudhary said his party was well prepared for the panchayat elections. He said the farmers were up in arms against the three agriculture related laws and they would certainly vote against the BJP and this would be repeated in the 2022 UP assembly elections.
