Lucknow, April 18: Mayawati today named her first list of candidates for next year’s Lok Sabha elections, half of them Brahmins, prompting suggestions that the BSP chief was planning to revive her successful 2007 formula of forging a Dalit-upper caste axis.
Among the 36 names she announced, 18 were Brahmins, one of them a charge-sheeted former Shiv Sena legislator accused of instigating a mob to pull down the Babri Masjid.
Pawan Pandey, who is out on bail, has been fielded from Sultanpur from where BJP general secretary Varun Gandhi is expected to contest.
Pandey is said to have some influence among upper castes in Sultanpur.
Sources said the picture would become clear once the names of the remaining 44 candidates for the 80 parliamentary seats in Uttar Pradesh are announced shortly.
If the first list hinted at a revival of Mayawati’s Dalit-Brahmin caste alliance, the BSP boss ensured the right visuals. She held the media conference, where she announced the first list, at the home of her party’s Brahmin face, Satish Chandra Mishra, an advocate and Rajya Sabha member.
In 2006, too, Mayawati had met the media at Mishra’s residence to announce her caste axis that helped her win the state elections the following year.
“Brahmins were misguided during the 2012 Assembly elections, but now they are back again with the BSP along with other upper castes,” Mayawati said today.
To impress Brahmin voters, she repeated her demand for reservation for the poor among the upper castes.
Among the other Brahmins she named are Rakeshdhar Tripathi, an accused in an assets case who has been fielded from Mirzapur; Nakul Dubey (Lucknow) and Rajya Sabha member Brajesh Pathak (Unnao). Tripathi and Dubey are both former ministers.
Another Brahmin leader, Mukul Upadhaya, has been fielded from Ghaziabad where BJP president Rajnath Singh is a sitting MP.
While courting Brahmins, Mayawati didn’t forget to consolidate her Dalit base. She has fielded R.K. Choudhury, who was close to her late mentor Kanshi Ram, from Mohanlalganj on Lucknow’s outskirts.
Choudhury, a Pasi leader, was a transport minister in Mayawati’s first government in the nineties. He had left the BSP in 2001 but returned to the party last week.
The Pasis make up 16 per cent of the state’s Dalit population. The Jatavs, the caste Mayawati belongs to, account for 56 per cent.
Bandit queen Phoolan Devi’s husband Umaid Singh has been fielded from Shahjahanpur in western Uttar Pradesh.
Mayawati’s main rival Samajwadi Party had released its list of candidates in November 2012. Samajwadi chief Mulayam Singh Yadav told reporters yesterday the elections, due next year, could be advanced to November.
