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(Excerpted with permission from Rajdeep Sardesai’s new book) 2024: The election that took India by surprisePublished by HarperCollins Publishers.)
Ayodhya turned saffron on the first Sunday of May 2024. A large number of Sangh Parivar workers from all over Uttar Pradesh had come to the city. The streets were being cleaned, the shops were in a festive mood and the lights of temples were twinkling in the night sky. Prime Minister Modi was on the election roadshow. Thousands of people stood in queue for this Visit The self-styled ‘Lord’ of political Hindutva is on his first visit to Ayodhya after the Ram temple consecration ceremony in January.
On every street corner, there were life-size cut-outs of the Prime Minister, with posters thanking Ram Lalla for bringing him ‘back home’ and promising a ‘Chaar Sau Paar’ victory as a return gift. As Modi climbed atop a gleaming yellow van and waved the BJP’s lotus symbol at the crowd, police had to stop the rowdy supporters showering rose petals and chanting ‘Jai Shri Ram’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’. Had to struggle for.
Standing behind Modi was Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, who was deliberately a step away from the star attraction.
Caught between the two giants, Lallu Singh is a sitting MP and five-time MLA from Ayodhya, which is part of the Faizabad Lok Sabha constituency. Singh rarely waved to the crowd, most of whom seemed to be enjoying another Modi moment.
Ram or employment?
The road show was being broadcast live on news channels, with on-air commentary breathlessly describing what the media described as ‘public excitement’. I and my team were shooting in Ayodhya the whole day for an election programme. We debated a provocative question – ‘Ram or employment’ – and heard a variety of voices.
The pilgrims who came from different parts of the country to get a glimpse of the Ram idol were mostly excited, and were praising the Modi government for building the temple. The shopkeepers in and around the temple premises also looked very happy. The increase in tourist traffic was good for business. We heard some locals complaining about rising LPG prices and civic corruption.
But BJP supporters silenced these discordant voices. Then, just as we were about to turn off the camera, an auto driver came into the frame and started insisting on his point. ‘Brother, neither Mathura, nor Kashi, this time Awadhesh Pasi!’ he announced emphatically. My first reaction was, ‘Awadhesh who?’ Like many Delhi-based journalists who parachute into the electoral battleground, I had not really understood the complex web of caste and community politics of Faizabad. ,
The man complained about how large-scale land deals were taking place between influential local BJP leaders and ‘outsiders’ for hotel complexes in the city, how municipal officials were demolishing old houses just to widen roads for tourists. Temple authorities were profiting from rising property prices and how ‘connected’ people were doing it. ,everything is a game of money (It’s all about money),’ he insisted.
Cut to Milkipur – and Awadhesh Prasad
The next morning, after Modi’s flashy road show, we were in Milkipur, a small tehsil town in Ayodhya district. Unlike the temple centre, no tourists visited Milkipur. No cameras filmed its dirty dirt tracks, and no VVIPs posed for photo-ops here.
But lack of media attention did not stop Samajwadi Party candidate from Faizabad, Awadhesh Prasad, from door-to-door campaigning in the area. Seventy-eight-year-old Prasad was a seasoned politician and sitting MLA from Milkipur, one of the five assembly constituencies included in the Faizabad Lok Sabha seat.
Wearing the Samajwadi Party’s distinctive red cap on his head and folded kurta-pajama, Prasad seemed happy to see us. He said laughingly, ‘Some national media has come to talk to us too.’
The grey-haired Prasad was no political novice but a nine-time MLA. He was jailed during the Emergency and won his first assembly election in 1977, a tumultuous year of Janata Party victories. He was a young political activist at the time, a self-confessed ‘clutches‘ (Follower) of former Prime Minister and Lok Dal leader Chaudhary Charan Singh.
His devotion to his guru was such that he could not attend his father’s funeral as he was in Amethi during the 1981 by-election in which Rajiv Gandhi made his electoral debut by defeating Lok Dal’s Sharad Yadav. Prasad was Yadav’s campaign manager and Charan Singh had instructed him not to leave the counting room until the final votes were counted.
When Samajwadi Party was formed in 1992, Prasad’s staunch loyalty towards ‘Netaji’ Mulayam Singh Yadav increased. The Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh was one of several regional parties that emerged when the Janata Dal split across the country.
A Dalit face from the Pasi subcaste in the Yadav-dominated party, Prasad was steadfast in his commitment to Netaji, even when the BSP had become the preferred choice for the majority Dalit voters. ,Our politics is one of loyalty, not idealism. (My politics is of loyalty, not opportunism)” he said. That is why when Akhilesh Yadav offered him the ticket, he agreed to accept the challenge of Faizabad without any hesitation.
As I tracked his campaign, it was clear that Prasad was unperturbed by the excitement around the Ram Temple. ‘BJP does its politics in the name of Ram; Does vote business. We are the real devotees of Ram; Many people in my family have names associated with Ram (BJP does politics on Ram; votes are a business for them. I am a true believer in Ram; many members of my family have Ram in their names),’ he argued. ,
‘Please do not see me as a Dalit leader. “I am a socialist first and last,” Prasad said as he took leave from us.
‘Kamandal’ and Mandal
Seen against the backdrop of the larger battle between ‘Kamandal’ and Mandal forces across religious and caste identities that have shaped Uttar Pradesh politics for three decades, Akhilesh Yadav’s choice of candidate was perfect. Prasad is a Dalit in a constituency with 26 per cent Dalit population, 14 per cent Muslim population and substantial Yadav and Kurmi OBC population.
On the other hand, BJP candidate Lallu Singh was a Thakur in a constituency where the number of upper castes was comparatively less. In a way, Ayodhya-Faizabad was the ideal demographic profile for Yadav to present his PDA alliance as an alternative to Hindutva politics. ,
When the result of Faizabad came, it was a bit shocking. Prasad had lived up to his claim of being a ‘real Ram devotee’. He won by over 50,000 votes, defeating not only his BJP rival Lallu Singh, but the entire Hindutva machine. Caste equations and local issues had trumped Hindu solidarity. Mandal had overpowered Kamandal.
And I was vividly reminded of some of the oldest rules of constituency journalism: One, never ignore the opinion of the roadside historian—as in this case, an auto driver—who is quietly willing to share a buck. Raises trouble. -Tend insight, and two, never get trapped in complacent and hyper-biased echo chambers.
(Veteran journalist Rajdeep Sardesai is currently the advisory editor of India Today Group and anchor of a prime time show on India Today.)