Mayawati is the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state. Uttar Pradesh accounts for 80 of the 543 seats of Lok Sabha, the lower house of Indian Parliament.
Among regional leaders, Mayawati and Sharad Pawar have been most vocal in their claim to be the next Prime Minister of India.
Mayawati and Bahujan Samaj Party's influence is limited to Uttar Pradesh and some pockets of neighbouring states though she is trying hard to project BSP as a national party. Years ago I attended a rally addressed by Kanshi Ram, the founder of BSP and Mayawati. I was impressed by their oratorial skills. She is trying her best to present BSP as a viable non-Congress, non-BJP alternative at the centre.
Caste and caste based hierarchy exists in 21st century India and political parties have mastered the art of exploiting these divisions. Mayawati is a shrewd politican and during the last assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh made a successful attempt to reach out to sections outside her traditional vote bank. During these Lok Sabha elections she has been pretty kind in allocating tickets to candidates who have deserted her rivals in Uttar Pradesh. These are realities of ground politics in India.
What troubles me is that like most other regional parties BSP hasn't groomed the second rung of leadership. I don't see any entity, be it political, economic or military, succeeding without a well distributed power structure. Bahujan Samaj Party may claim to be the front runner in their determination to uplift the Dalits but the internal organisation of the party is very undemocratic and uninspiring.
So what are the chances of Mayawati becoming the next Prime Minister of India.
In the 2004 general elections BSP contesed 435 seats in the country and won 19. My hunch is that if both, the Congress and the BJP fall short of the 150 mark (minus allies) and the BSP crosses the 50 seats then Mayawati would have a very good shot at the Prime Ministerial post.
The good thing about BSP is that it has partnered with the Congress and the BJP, the two big national players and rather than the third front, I see either the Congress or the BJP supporting her to prevent the other from coming to power. Communists too don't have any oblection to her being the PM candidate of the 3rd front. But the third front for all practical purposes would come into existence, if it does, after the elections are over. There has been no formal seat sharing agreement. What's interesting is that many partners of Congress (UPA) and BJP (NDA) have decided to ditch the national parties.
I really wanted to take a look at the various pre-poll predictions on the structure of the next Lok Sabha but feeling lazy these days.
Related Posts :
Congress UPA Set to Form the Next Indian Government : 16.05.2009
India Next Government : UPA or NDA : 14.05.2009
Rahul Gandhi Next Prime Minister Of India : 18.03.2009
Is Advani Trying to Emaulate Obama's Social Media Strategy? : 26.01.2009
0 comments:
Post a Comment