Political History

From Congress to Congress-Opposition System

The colonial administration formed the United Provinces by a merger of two smaller units in 1902. While other colonial mega-provinces split into smaller states after Independence, UP remained intact – even retaining its abbreviated name, although its content was changed to

“Uttar Pradesh” (“the Northern Provinces” in Hindi). The state’s borders remained unchanged until 2001, when the Himalayan region in the northwest seceded to form the state of Uttarakhand (P. Singh 2015: 95-96).

Following the pattern suggested by Yadav (1996), the political system of UP was dominated by Congress until 1989, but as the party slowly declined, the dominant-party system evolved into a Congress-Opposition system. The UP Congress drew electoral support from the

“coalition of extremes,” appealing to the top (upper castes) and bottom (Dalits, Muslims) of the social hierarchy, with less support from OBCs (Jaffrelot 2003: 48-87, 427, Zérinini 2009: 56).

The initially marginal opposition grew in strength in the 1960s (see table 6.1). There were three main opposition forces: The Hindu right, the Socialists, and the agrarianist parties (Hasan 2001, Pai 2013). These were all part of broader North Indian movements, and had national ambitions.

The Hindu right was Congress’ most persistent rival. Its main party, the Jana Sangh, was highly organised and had a strong social foundation (Corbridge and Harriss 2000: 173-193). The Socialist parties were North India’s main left-wing opposition, popular among lower castes and farmers. The first agrarianist party, the Bharatiya Kranti Dal (BKD), formed in 1967 and was led by ex-Congressman Charan Singh. Appealing to the middle peasantry, the BKD absorbed

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parts of the Socialists’ base. In 1974, the BKD and the largest Socialist party merged to form a new party, the Lok Dal (Jaffrelot 2003: 254-304, Pai 2013). In 1977, the Jana Sangh, Lok Dal and remaining Socialist parties all merged into the Janata Party (Guha 2007: 519).

Before 1989, the opposition interrupted Congress rule thrice. During the turbulent years from 1967 to 1974, hung parliaments and Congress splits enabled Charan Singh to form two short-lived governments – one in 1967-68, supported by all the main opposition parties; and one in 1970, supported by Indira Gandhi’s Congress. The Janata Party won both the federal and UP elections in 1977. Charan Singh became Deputy Prime Minister of India, while his ally Ram Naresh Yadav became Chief Minister of UP and implemented agrarianist and pro-OBC reforms. The Janata Party’s conservative wing disapproved of his reforms, and in 1979 he was toppled and replaced by a moderate ex-Congressman. In 1980 the Janata Party disintegrated, and Congress returned to power at the centre and in UP in new elections, repeating the feat in 1985. The Hindu right formed the BJP, while the agrarianist/socialist opposition fragmented.

In 1989, most of the agrarianist and socialist parties merged into a new national party, the Janata Dal (Corbridge and Harriss 2000: 85-92, Jaffrelot 2003: 254-386).

The New Three-Party System

The state elections of 1989, 1991, and 1993 established a highly competitive multiparty party system with the BJP, SP and BSP as the main parties. The Janata Dal won the 1989 elections, forming a state government led by Mulayam Singh Yadav. The elections also marked the entrance of the Dalit-based BSP into the Legislative Assembly. In the 1991 elections, called after the Janata Dal government at the centre disintegrated, the BJP won a majority. The centre dismissed the BJP government in 1992, due to its implication in the Ayodhya incident – a violent demolition of a mosque by a Hindu mob, which sparked countrywide anti-Muslim violence (Guha 2007: 628-634). Ahead of the 1993 elections, Mulayam⁹ formed a new party, the Samajwadi Party, which effectively replaced the Janata Dal in UP (Jaffrelot 2003: 371).

Seeking to unite lower-caste and Muslim voters against the upper-caste, anti-Muslim right, the SP and BSP formed an electoral alliance that narrowly beat the BJP and formed a coalition government headed by Mulayam (Pai 2002: 162-63).

However, relations between the SP and BSP soon soured. In 1995, the BSP withdrew from the coalition and formed a new majority with the BJP, which offered its support for a government led by Mayawati, the state’s first Dalit CM. However, the BJP withdrew its support after a few

9 Like the BSP’s Mayawati, Mulayam Singh Yadav is usually referred to on a first-name basis.

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months, initiating a crisis of governance that led to President’s rule and new elections. The elections of 1996 and 2002 produced hung parliaments, and until 2007 the politics of UP were marked by unstable coalitions and periods of President’s rule. Mayawati briefly returned to the Chief Ministry in 1997 and 2002-03; but both her governments relied on uneasy and short-lived alliances with the BJP. The BJP governed with support from BSP defectors from 1997 to 2002;

while the SP governed with a plurality from 2003 to 2007 (Pai 2002: 155-179, The Wire 2017c).

In 2007, the BSP became the first party since 1991 to win a parliamentary (if not electoral) majority. The BSP owed its victory to strengthened non-Dalit support, including from the upper castes, and the new Mayawati government had less of a radical Dalit profile than its three predecessors (S. Singh and Kumar 2012: 10-11). In 2012, the SP won a parliamentary majority and Mulayam’s son, Akhilesh Yadav (born 1973), became Chief Minister. In 2017, the BJP won a landslide victory in the state. The catastrophic performance of both lower-caste parties, along with efforts to de-emphasise caste from both BJP and the SP’s young new leadership, signals a possible end to the lower-caste era of UP politics (Verma 2014, Pai 2017, Pai and Kumar 2017).

43 Table 6.1. State Assembly elections in UP

Year Four largest parties (seats) Minor

parties and

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