Lucknow: The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has stepped up its activities in Uttar Pradesh ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections and is working closely with the ruling the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to take the Yogi Adityanath government’s development and law and order track record to voters.
Discussions at a 16 September coordination meeting between senior BJP leaders and RSS functionaries at a resort in Lucknow centred on preparing the organisation and its workers for the elections and ensuring greater coordination among the government, the party and Sangh workers.
Although the BJP has not officially announced its election strategy, sources said the RSS wants the party to fight the 2027 polls with Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath as its face. As part of the strategy, the coordination meeting emphasised taking the government’s work, particularly its ‘strong law and order narrative’ and development initiatives to villages and communities across the state.
According to RSS functionaries in Uttar Pradesh, the organisation appears more active this time than it was during the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Coordination between government functionaries and the RSS has also increased over the past two years, while Sangh functionaries have been holding feedback meetings with senior BJP leaders.
Senior RSS functionaries from various regions also participated in the recent Lucknow meeting. Those present included BJP national general secretary (organisation) B.L. Santosh, RSS joint general secretary Arun Kumar, the BJP’s UP in-charge Vinod Tawde, RSS eastern region pracharak Anil Kumar, Awadh prant pracharak Kaushal Kishore, Kanpur prant pracharak Shri Ram, BJP state president Pankaj Chaudhary and state general secretary (organisation) Dharampal Singh, besides functionaries of several affiliated organisations.
The meeting was held in three stages. First, a joint meeting was held in which participants were asked to provide feedback on the preparations for the elections. Separate meetings with the Kanpur and Awadh regions were subsequently held.
After taking feedback from the participants, Santosh, Arun Kumar and Tawde outlined the broader election strategy. ThePrint has learnt that they told participants that the Opposition would attempt to create a narrative against the government, but the challenge was that BJP and Sangh workers themselves could get influenced by such narratives.
“The Opposition will try to create confusion. It does not have any major issue, but the problem is that our own people are also getting caught in that narrative. Even youngsters in our families are getting confused. We first need to understand the situation ourselves and then explain it clearly to our people,” a source quoted the leaders as saying.
The meeting also discussed issues such as the UGC row and paper leaks. Participants were told that the government was taking action on such issues and that the stringent law brought in against paper leaks should be communicated to party and Sangh workers as well as the wider public.
The message, according to sources, was to ensure that the BJP and the RSS do not allow the Opposition’s narrative to dominate the political discourse before the elections.
The leadership also asked functionaries to develop and communicate their own narrative by highlighting welfare and development work undertaken by the central and state governments.
The ongoing one-month ‘Seva Sankalp Abhiyan’ was discussed as an opportunity to increase contact with the people and involve more workers and members of the public in the campaign.
“We have to set our own narrative and go to the people with the work done by the central and state governments. Whatever the government is doing at present should also be communicated to the public,” a functionary said. “In our interactions with the common public, now we will talk more about the government’s work, and law and order.”
The coordination meeting also focused on improving coordination among the government, the BJP and the RSS at the grassroots level so that complaints and concerns raised by workers could be addressed quickly.
Law & order narrative to promote Yogi
According to people familiar with the discussions, the Yogi government’s law-and-order record and development work are expected to form an important part of the campaign narrative for the 2027 Assembly elections.
An RSS functionary from Prayagraj said the organisation’s functionaries appeared more active this time compared to the 2024 Lok Sabha election.
“One important reason is that Yogi Adityanath has good relations with senior RSS functionaries in Uttar Pradesh. Anil ji, the pracharak from eastern Uttar Pradesh, is considered close to him. His relations with Mahendra ji, the pracharak in western UP, are also considered cordial. Some other prant (regions) pracharaks are also believed to be in his good books,” the functionary said.
Yogi’s interaction, this functionary said, with senior RSS functionaries was more personal than with some BJP functionaries.
“His interaction with Sangh functionaries is more personal. There has also been an effort to ensure better coordination between the Sangh and the chief minister’s core team, including through an OSD.”
(Edited by Sugita Katyal)