Caste is indubitably one of the most significant tools used by political parties to mobilise voters. Such is the relevance of caste-based issues in the upcoming Madhya Pradesh assembly election that the BJP, which has been reluctant to accept the demand for caste census, has now broken its silence. During the election campaign in the state, none other than Home Minister Amit Shah announced that the party is not against the caste census. The issue seems to have put the BJP on the back foot. However, it’s worth noting how the party has nominated candidates from different castes.
Based on fieldwork data collected from interviews of district office bearers of the BJP, we provide a detailed analysis of the caste composition of the party’s candidates.
BJP candidates and caste
In the ongoing elections in Madhya Pradesh, upper castes still hold greater relevance than any other broader caste administrative category in the candidates’ list of the BJP. Figure 1 demonstrates that they constitute 34 per cent (79 tickets) of the share of the candidates nominated by the party and the share of Other Backward Castes (OBC) candidates is 30 per cent (69 tickets).
For the purpose of our analysis, we have clubbed the candidates from the Jain and Sikh communities in the broader upper caste category. Madhya Pradesh is a state with the largest number of tribes in India, and 21 per cent (47 tickets) of BJP candidates belong to the tribal category. The party has not nominated a single tribal candidate in any unreserved constituency. Similar is the political fate of Scheduled Castes: Only 15 per cent (35 tickets) of them are nominated but all are in reserved constituencies. The party has not nominated a single Muslim candidate.
According to data submitted by the state government to the Madhya Pradesh High Court, OBCs constitute 51 per cent of the state’s population. If the data passes the test, upper castes make up roughly 10 per cent of Madhya Pradesh’s population.
However, the community’s political grip over the BJP can be seen in the number of nominated candidates—10 per cent of the upper caste population constitutes 34 per cent of BJP’s nominated candidates. Despite the prevalence of the rhetoric of the political consciousness of the OBCs, the BJP has only picked one-third of its candidates from the community comprising more than half of the state’s population. As is the case in most of the north Indian states, tribals and SCs are hardly considered to run for political office in unreserved seats.
Also read: Modi govt’s reluctance for caste census is a political move to hide ground realities
Power dynamics of Jatis
Nowadays, it is argued that the broader administrative level caste category serves less purpose in electoral analysis and jatis hold the greater salience. This is because of disproportionate power dynamics among the jatis clubbed as upper castes, OBCs, SCs, and STs. Therefore, we also demonstrate the jati-wise candidate composition of the party in Figure 2.
Figure 2 reveals that the BJP nominated more than 10 per cent of its candidates from three castes and communities—Brahmin, Rajput and Gond
Brahmins top the list with 30 candidates. Second in line are Rajputs who got 28 tickets. One needs to focus more on the relationship between the Thakurs and the BJP in Madhya Pradesh. Among the 79 upper caste candidates nominated by the BJP, Brahmins and Rajputs get the lion’s share of 58 tickets.
Gonds and Bhils carry high political weightage after Brahmins and Rajputs, with 23 and 19 seats, respectively. Only five tribes are nominated by the party with the aforementioned tribes getting around 90 per cent of the tickets among STs.
The party has nominated 11 Lodhis and 10 Khatiks. Uma Bharti, the influential leader of the Lodhi community, was putting pressure on the party to fulfil the demands of the OBC community. This can be interpreted as the party’s strategy to placate her by not only nominating the largest number of candidates from her jati but also a sizeable number among the total number of tickets, ranking fifth overall in terms of representation. Yadavs, though considered the largest jati among OBCs could only manage eight tickets. Kurmis got one ticket less than Yadavs. The party has nominated five candidates from Kalar jati. Overall, among 69 OBC candidates nominated by the party, 53 candidates belong to just 10 jatis.
Khatiks make up 10 candidates out of the total number of candidates, thereby leading the list not only among SCs but also securing a substantial number of tickets (6th in overall rank). It needs to be noted that Khatiks barely fall under the top 10 jatis in Madhya Pradesh, according to the 2011 Census. Moreover, Jatavs/Ahirwars are just behind Khatiks in the party’s candidate list with eight tickets. But numerically, they are the most populated jati among SCs in Madhya Pradesh like other north Indian states. Among 35 SC candidates on the list, only four jatis—Khatik, Jatav, Mehra, Balai—got the most tickets.
The party has nominated eight candidates from the Jain community and five from the Baniya community. The fact that the party hasn’t nominated any Muslim candidate raises a question about the seriousness of its attempts to mobilise Pasmandas. Similarly, no Christian figures in the candidate list.
In a nutshell, the candidate nomination strategy of the BJP indicates that the upper castes constitute a disproportionate number in the list. The OBCs are yet to be proportionately represented. However, the party might still sail through the election because of the image of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who belong to the OBC community. Moreover, the party can face trouble when the principal opposition party, the Congress starts nominating a higher number of OBC candidates. We will look into the nomination strategy of the Congress party in our next article.
Dharmanshu Dhakar (@dddharmanshu) is a PhD Scholar at Jiwaji University, Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh. Arvind Kumar (@arvind_kumar__) is a Lecturer/ Assistant Professor at Royal Holloway, University of London. Views are personal.
(Edited by Ratan Priya)