The long shadow of caste, and why the BJP is dragging its feet

By Smita Gupta

Today, three decades after the VP Singhled National Front government officially  accepted the Mandal Commission Report in 1990, when it brought the Other  Backward Castes (OBCs) to centre-stage,  the BJP has repeatedly demonstrated  how it has mastered the art of social  engineering. It has deployed caste –  alongside Hindutva – to capture hearts  and minds to maximum advantage in  Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring Bihar.  Together, these two states account for a  whopping 120 Lok Sabha seats in Parliament. OBCs account for around 54 per  cent of the population in Uttar Pradesh  alone, and of the state’s 312 BJP MLAs,  as many as 101 belong to these communities.

The BJP reinforced that message,  when the party’s first Chief Minister  of Uttar Pradesh Kalyan Singh died last  week and the party gave him a state funeral, wrapping his coffin in the national  tricolour. But, in a bid to emphasise the  fact that he was one of their own – not  just the BJP’s first Hindu Hriday Samrat but one of its tallest OBC leaders who  had shown the way - the party placed  the BJP standard over the national flag.

It drew protests from the Opposition  that said it was a violation of the Flag  Code. But for the BJP, any Constitutional  transgression takes second place to getting its electoral message across: the  Lodhs, the OBC community to which  Kalyan Singh belonged, make up about  five per cent of the state’s population.

Indeed, over the years, the BJP – and  RSS – have painstakingly identified, especially among the smaller non-Yadav  OBC communities, icons and inspirational figures that they can build up and  use as objects to revere. That in turn,  helps present day leaders use these icons  to bring these communities on board. It  has had great success, largely, albeit not  exclusively, in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.

In the just concluded monsoon session of Parliament, the BJP -- with the  help of the entire Opposition –pushed  through the 127th Constitution Amendment Bill to demonstrate its commitment to the OBCs. The new Act allows  states to draw up their own lists of  OBCs, even as it granted constitutional  status to the Backward Classes Commission, and made provisions for OBC  reservation in medical colleges and in  central schools.

But when it came to holding a caste  census – the last was done in 1931 -- the  BJP is maintaining a strategic silence. The clamour for it is growing though.  Not only has it seen arch rivals Bihar  Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Tejashwi Yadav of the Rashtriya Janata  Dal joining forces in Bihar to push for  it, so has the entire state legislature  that includes many of the state’s top  BJP leaders.

Indeed, for the BJP, apart from its  well-founded fear that a caste census  might upset the current configuration  and lead to Mandal Wars.2, the fact  that its own OBC contingent is pushing vigorously for it is fast becoming  more than a source of embarrassment:  it might well lead to cleavages within  the party, among the OBCs themselves  if their relative numbers change, and  spark battles with both the Scheduled  Tribes and Castes on the one hand and  the Upper Castes on the other. More so,  if the total population of OBCs itself is  seen to have grown at a faster pace than  the other communities. With leaders  like Tejashwi Yadav pointing out that  an accurate caste census would better  help shape and target welfare policies,  any change in the status quo is certain  to have its own blowback. The BJP has  worked out its formula – and doesn’t  want to not just go back to the drawing  board but also deal with the messy business of thinking quotas afresh.

An illustration from Karnataka, the  one state that did conduct a caste census in 2015, will make this clear. Karnataka ordered a Social and Educational  Survey in 2014 when Siddaramaiah was  Chief Minister and the Congress was in  power to enable the state government  to decide quotas in the OBC category as  per the 127th Constitution Amendment  Bill. The survey, conducted in April/ May 2015, reportedly surveyed 1.3 cr  households in Karnataka. By April  2016, the report was apparently ready –  but is yet to see the light of day, despite  demands by many organisations and  political leaders.

The real reason could be that the  state’s most politically significant communities, the Vokkaligas and the Lingayats, and