Obstacles in growth: Identity politics of BIMARU states

India, that is Bharat, is the largest democracy in the world. Even though a partially free one now, it is popularly known for its ‘unity in diversity. Fortunately, or maybe not so, the politicians have been carrying this principle with them successfully. Despite disparities in various aspects, ranging from ideology and economics to caste and reservation, almost all of them have been united on exploiting divisive politics, because apparently, development could not have delivered them what identity can. 

Courtesy: Weebly

Based on ideological leaning many might think that some states, especially in southern India, are expectational to this fact. My advice to such readers is, think again. People tend to forget that India is a unique country. Maybe the only nation where even the voters of the communist party tend to hold their religious identity close to them. Net net, from the BIMARU states of the Hindi heartland to development models of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, identity has been dominating Indian politics since the first general election in 1951.

However, the term identity politics can be interpreted in numerous ways by various thinkers. Broadly, any individual’s identity can be an amalgamation of various factors including religion, caste, community and socioeconomic status. In this article, we will look at the issue of identity politics from these four lenses.

Division wins elections

All the political parties, whether right or left, have these tools at their disposal and thinking twice before using them can cost an election. The question that pertains before every poll is ‘whether religion can unite what caste divides’ or ‘if caste can divide what religion unites’? 

For the BJP for instance, if the hard nationalism and Hindutva narrative gets the backward classes to go beyond the caste identity, then the BJP juggernaut keeps moving. While exploiting the religious insecurities among Hindus, Modi-Shah BJP can gladly neglect the Muslim votes.  In any state, 50% of Hindu votes can assure them a landslide victory. 

Madhav Solanki: Architect of KHAM politics

Courtesy: Business Standard

On the other hand, parties like Congress and NCP, generally called the seculars, tend to work on the KHAM formulation, consisting of Ksatriya, Harijan(scheduled castes), Adivasis(scheduled tribes) and Muslim. This equation, initially used in Gujrat to keep Patels out of power, was responsible for ensuring a majority of UPA in Lok Sabha along with domination in various states. Regional or caste-based parties like Samajwadi and BSP tend to work with some specific castes along with Muslims. 

After all, everything was a facade

Though these formulations have been quite successful for the respective parties using them, governments are quite economical in delivering anything substantive for the upliftment of communities they appeal to.

Even after being in power for 7 years in toto and serving a full term, Dalits of the largest state of India still find themselves in dungeons of poverty. Not much has changed even for her core jatav voters as they are still among the most backward castes, both socially and economically. 

Left to Right: Mayawati, Yogi Adityanath and Akhilesh Yadav

Courtesy: Deccan Herald

In 1999-2000 the gap between monthly expenditure of upper castes and Dalits stood at 38%. After the end of BSP’s term in 2011-12, the gap still stood at 37%, indicating negligible growth for the notionally dominant political community.

Same trend was followed under the Yadav regime as well. Growth rate of UP, which was already on a downwards trend, fell further under Samajwadi Party. As per an article by Economic times, in the first four years of Akhilesh’s government, economic growth was lower than that of Mayawati’s and nowhere near Nitish. Under the Yogi regime as well the downward graph continues. 

In Bihar, the conditions are even appalling. There are innumerable fields that the Mandal school of thought missed. Till 2020 only 3 per cent of Yadavs, who form a major part of OBCs in Bihar, are enrolling for higher education after school. This is the lowest even among OBCs as Kurmis and Kushwaha stand at 5.3% and 4.1% respectively. 

Such fact when highlighted highly contrast the claims of “Yadav Raj” under Lalu Prasad Yadav’s RJD government. Same goes for the state of Uttar Pradesh where SP won the polls on the pretext of being a Yadav government. 

How does it play today?

Today’s BIMARU states, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh,  Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, might be the laggards in terms of growth but are politically the most powerful. These states when put together send 199 MPs to Lok Sabha. To put it in perspective, out of these 199, BJP candidates won 151 in 2019. The number is even higher when other NDA partners are combined.

Situation in these states come out even grimmer when we look at the NFHS 5 data. Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh are the four poorest states of India while Chattisgarh and Rajasthan stand at number 7 and 8 respectively. All thanks to the hilly states of Meghalaya and Assam that all of Hindi heartland does not appear consecutively. 

Multidimentionally poor people in states

Courtesy: NITI aayog

This data quite successfully held a mirror to everyone as it was revealed that almost 52% of people are multidimensionally poor in Bihar while in Jharkhand, UP and MP it is 42, 38 and 37% respectively. To further put it in perspective, if we look at the states with a poverty rate higher than 20% then the 12 states, Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Meghalaya, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Orissa, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and West Bengal, listed in the order of highest to lowest,  put together sends 280 MPs to Lok Sabha.

The key lies in the following data. Out of these 280, NDA rules 215, while the BJP alone won 188 in 2019. Unfortunate part is, the situation seems to be worsening in future when these statistics are put into perspective. 

In the same NFHS 5 report it was highlighted that while India’s population as a whole will now start shrinking, states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh are still exploding with population. Both these continue to grow at a rate of 3 and 2.7 respectively. Combining this idea with the process of delimitation due in the year 2026, things can turn disastrous for everything, from economy to democracy, concerning the nation. 

If trends continue like this, then it will not be wrong to say that progressive states, like Haryana, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, will be punished for their progress, work, policies and growth.