Column

The most fascinating aspect of the ongoing Uttar Pradesh elections is that the Gen Next is taking over in every party. Rahul Gandhi is leading the Congress, having decided to go for the jugular when the going was tough for the party. It is a more confident — and assertive — Gandhi in evidence today, as he literally rolls up his kurta sleeves to make his points combatively at rallies. From Phulpur in November to Meerut in February, the transformation is marked, and it is not limited to him speaking extempore without notes. He is drawing the battle lines for 2014; UP is only a semi-final.

When Rahul says the Congress will not have a post-poll alliance with any party, he is not just asking people to give greater preference to his party. Nor is he just trying to retain the support of those who deserted the SP. He wants to reassure the upper castes, disenchanted with Mayawati but still unwilling to trust the SP, whose ‘goondaraj’ they have not forgotten, that the Congress will not make common cause with the SP.

He may also be signalling that the Congress may not be averse to sitting out of government in the event of a hung assembly. There are Congressmen who believe that if a government can’t be formed, President’s Rule with elections held again a few months down the line may go to favour the Congress.

However, Rahul’s ‘go it alone’ way — the only way to build the Congress organisation — may have to be tempered by the imperatives of the UPA, which is eyeing the SP’s numbers to stabilise the government, which has otherwise been buffeted around in the last 18 months, to be able to offset the Trinamool Congress’ stalling techniques and to pursue economic reforms.

Then there is Akhilesh Yadav, who is also being received enthusiastically. He is leading the SP’s campaign instead of his father Mulayam Singh, indicating a transfer of power in the party. He is not only spearheading the campaign, he is also calling the shots in the party.

Like Gandhi, who has had a major say in ticket distribution and strategy, Akhilesh has ensured that the SP, which shunned English and computers, is now embracing them. What is more, he prevented the entry of the otherwise powerful ‘don’ DP Yadav, and removed party veteran Mohan Singh as spokesperson for defending the don in a calculated bid to send a message to the upper castes that the SP was turning a new leaf.

Similarly, at the first Congress-RLD rally in Meerut to kick off the combine’s campaign in western UP, it was Gandhi and Jayant Chaudhury, and not senior leaders, who drew applause from the audience. People said Ajit Singh’s son reminded them of Choudhary Charan Singh, his grandfather. Like Gandhi, Chaudhury struck notes that went beyond caste or community to creating jobs unlike Ajit Singh and Digvijay Singh who spoke about job reservation to the Jats in the central OBC list!

That Chaudhury, a Lok Sabha MP, is contesting for an assembly seat in UP this time is one more straw in the wind to indicate the possibility of a SP-Congress-RLD government in Lucknow. Jayant, who cannot be a minister in Delhi because his father Ajit Singh has joined the UPA government, may stand a chance to enter government in Lucknow, to be groomed for the future.

The BJP has also fielded the comparatively younger Uma Bharati in UP. Though she belongs to the Madhya Pradesh side of Bundelkhand, she appeals to certain sections. But she has to contend with stiff opposition from within her party.

As for the BSP, it is Mayawati all the way, though this time a beleaguered BSP chief has been compelled to bring Satish Mishra to the fore, much more visibly than in the past.

The rise of younger leaders is bound to spawn a new kind politics in the months to come. As a matter of interest, the younger breed of politicians, cutting across parties, also enjoy a rapport with each other, and are able to pick up the phone and talk to each other.

As for the election, this is probably UP’s most unpredictable election ever. There would be few polls in the past where the situation was as confused or fragmented as it is now.

This has been compounded by the delimitation exercise, the entry and exodus of a large number of candidates from one party to another, a four-cornered contest and a host of fringe parties in the fray, making it a mindboggling exercise for surveys to capture the voters’ mood. One thing that can be said with a near certainty is that this time it will be a hung assembly.

— The writer is a social and political commentator