Under BJP’s shrinking umbrella in UP, smooth sailing for Sanjay Nishad

Sanjay Nishad (extreme right) at a joint rally with Amit Shah, UP CM Yogi Adityanath, and UP Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya. (Express Photo: Vishal Srivastav)

THE BJP is a tough partner when it comes to allies. However, as the Uttar Pradesh elections heats up, the party has gone out of its way to accommodate one of them – NISHAD Party chief Sanjay Nishad.

The generosity has survived Nishad calling the Income Tax raids on Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav ill-timed, and the embarrassment he caused the BJP by warning publicly earlier this year that he be named deputy chief minister for the coming Assembly elections or “face the Nishad community’s wrath”. Later, he also demanded a Cabinet berth for his son Praveen Nishad at the Centre.

The reason is Nishad’s usefulness as the BJP mops up caste votes for the elections. The NISHAD (Nirbal Indian Shoshit Hamara Aam Dal) Party, with its base among fishermen and boatmen, claims influence over “18% of the state’s voters” (others say it is considerably lower) and as many as 160 Assembly seats.

Read | Back I-T searches, but action could have been taken earlier: BJP ally Nishad

So, despite the fact that the NISHAD Party has only one MLA in UP, and one MP (Praveen, elected from Sant Kabir Nagar), both Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath were present for a joint rally with it in Lucknow. In his speech, Shah praised the NISHAD Party for its contribution to the BJP’s win in UP in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

In the 2017 Assembly polls, the NISHAD Party had contested on its own, fielding candidates in 72 seats. While it won just one, it got significant votes in Gorakhpur, Kushinagar, Azamgarh, Jaunpur, Bhadohi, Sultanpur, Auraiya, Kanpur Rural, Hamirpur, Allahabad, Ambedkar Nagar and Maharajganj constituencies, apart from others.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the NISHAD Party’s Praveen had contested on a BJP ticket and won.
The BJP announced in September that it would tie up with the party again for the coming Assembly elections.
“There is no doubt Sanjay Nishad is a tall leader of the Nishad community and has a strong following among the Nishads, Mallahs, Kevats who survive on rivers, and their flora and fauna,” a BJP leader said, pointing out that as a supporter of the SP, the NISHAD Party had helped the SP-BSP alliance defeat the BJP in the Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha bypolls in 2018.

BJP state spokesperson Rakesh Tripathi played down Sanjay Nishad’s remarks hinting at differences on issues. “We are separate parties with separate leaderships. But when we look at the larger canvas of UP, both the parties are committed to work for development of the state,” he said.

The BJP is, separately, trying to woo Nishad voters on own. Last month, the BJP’s ‘Fishermen Cell’ launched a ‘Kamal Nauka Yatra’ across the state to reach out to communities surviving on rivers. Said a BJP leader: “The party has sent Jai Prakash Nishad to the Rajya Sabha. We also have a minister in the state cabinet who is a Nishad.”

The NISHAD Party’s graph has also gone up on account of the BJP losing ally Suheldeo Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP), of Om Prakash Rajbhar, to the SP. The BJP had courted the SBSP as assiduously as the NISHAD Party and tied up with it for the 2017 Assembly polls, ignoring its potshots. After the SBSP won four seats, Rajbhar was made a minister, though he continued to attack the Adityanath government.

A BJP ally who is also watching its equations with the NISHAD Party closely is Apna Dal (S). A weakened BJP means it is hopeful of getting a larger share in seats.