"The path to power at the center in India passes through Uttar Pradesh", this proverb in political circles is being uttered neither for the first time nor for the last. Voting for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections has started on February 10. Polling will be held in the state in seven phases till March 7 and the result will come on March 10.
On Thursday, voting was held in the western districts of UP adjoining the national capital Delhi. For the first phase, votes were cast in 58 assembly seats in 11 districts here.
BBC correspondent Geeta Pandey from Meerut and Vikas Pandey from Delhi tell how a lot is at stake in western UP's voting.
Last week, hundreds of supporters of India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) gathered in a small field in a village in Uttar Pradesh's Meerut district during a cold winter.
Many of them were standing with saffron flags on tractors that brought people from nearby villages to join the rally. All these were waiting for the arrival of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
When Adityanath, 49, a Yogi-turned-politician, came on stage, the crowd greeted him with the slogans of "Yogi-Yogi" and "Yogi Adityanath Zindabad" by showing party flags.
In his short 10-minute speech, Adityanath targeted the opposition parties and counted the achievements of his government.
He asked the people present in the fray, "Will you vote for my candidate?" To this, the crowd responded positively.
After CM Yogi's departure, his supporters told BBC News that they would vote for BJP because the party has taken steps for the welfare of farmers and also improved the law and order in the area.
Despite all this, many indications suggested that things are not that easy for the party here. People who arrived at the rally wearing black sweaters or jackets were asked to open them. A local journalist told that this was done because the organizers feared that black clothes should be used by someone as a way to show the black flag to the chief minister.
Voters are giving indications against the opposition of BJP leaders?
In the past few weeks, there have been more than a dozen such cases inside western Uttar Pradesh where BJP candidates were thrown mud, black flags were shown to them, or stones were pelted at them.
Voting was held in Meerut and its adjoining western UP districts during the first phase of elections on Thursday. In the last assembly elections of the year 2017, people made BJP their first choice in this area, but this time it is a bit difficult.
The anger against the BJP here can be gauged from yet another cold day exactly a year ago, when Rakesh Tikait, a prominent farmer leader from the region, released a video of him crying. In this video, he was asking his supporters to stand on the border of Delhi.
These farmers were protesting since November 2020 at different borders of Delhi against the three agricultural laws brought by the Modi government at the Centre. Till a few days before the arrival of the video, the crowd of farmers on the borders had started decreasing.
The video of Rakesh Tikait quickly went viral, after which the youth started gathering once again at the dharna site by filling them in tractors and trucks. Already angry with the Modi government's three agricultural laws, the anger of these farmers increased after the video of Rakesh Tikait went viral. The farmers saw this as an insult to their leader.
After this, farmers' demonstrations continued on all other borders of Delhi including Ghaziabad till November 2021 i.e. till PM Modi announced the withdrawal of all three agricultural laws.
The timing of the return of laws was also important because assembly elections were on the head in five states of the country. Experts said the laws were withdrawn because Modi and his party feared losing their voters in western Uttar Pradesh.
But by the time the law was withdrawn, substantial damage had been done. Now Rakesh Tikait has become the face of anti-BJP farmers in the state.
In the year 2017, the BJP got more than 50 out of 70 assembly seats in this region. There is a total of 403 assembly seats in UP. At that time, BJP did this charisma due to the unity of nationalism and Hindu votes.
But the question is, will BJP be able to repeat this charismatic performance? Although Rakesh Tikait has not allied with any party, he has given enough indications to his supporters that "they should not vote for a party that insults farmers".
Farmers' protest and Jayant Chaudhary BJP's challenge
There is one more reason, due to which the BJP may get a setback. The re-emergence of the forgotten regional party Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) under the leadership of Jayant Choudhary. Jayant Chaudhary, the grandson of former Prime Minister of India Chaudhary Charan Singh and son of Ajit Singh, who has been a minister in different governments, has once again revived the RLD.
In 2017, the RLD had to lose even in its strongholds to the BJP as the Jat community, which played a key role here at that time, did not support the party.
The BJP's strategy of uniting the Jat Hindu voters also got a lot of benefit from it. But this time, there is no guarantee that Jat voters, who played a big role in the farmers' movement, will remain with the BJP.
Jayant Chaudhary, who spoke openly in favor of farmers during the movement, got a lot of support when the video of the police attack on him in October 2020 went viral.
He was injured when police used force to stop Chaudhary while on his way to meet the family of the Hathras rape victim. At that time, this rape case caught fire because the police allegedly cremated the victim's body without the permission of the family.
The police dismissed the allegations but this allowed the opposition parties to attack the Yogi Adityanath government.
Jayant Chaudhary has tied up with Samajwadi Party for the Uttar Pradesh elections. SP chief Akhilesh Yadav is still considered to be the biggest rival of Yogi Adityanath in the state.
While the RLD has huge support among farmers, the SP has a vote base of Muslims and backward castes. They constitute over 26 percent of the total voters of western Uttar Pradesh.
If these three communities will vote unilaterally, which experts are also predicting, then it will prove to be a challenge for the BJP.
Why is Uttar Pradesh important?
UP is the most populous state of India with a population of about 24 crores. If UP is considered a separate country, then it will be the fifth largest country in the world in terms of population after China, India, America, and Indonesia.
Uttar Pradesh has the highest number of 80 Lok Sabha seats in the country and it is said that the party which wins in Uttar Pradesh remains in power at the Centre.
Along with India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and the current PM Narendra Modi, UP has been the electoral area of many Prime Ministers.
This time in UP, 15 crore voters will exercise their franchise in the elections being held in seven phases.
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