Indian Politics & Policy Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2020 | Page 71
The Backwards Turn Right in the Hindi
Belt: Trajectories and Implications 1
Mohd. Sanjeer Alam
Indian Politics & Policy • Vol. 3, No. 1 • Spring 2020
Associate Professor at the Centre for the Study of
Developing Societies (CSDS) in New Delhi, India
[email protected]
Abstract
In India, various social groups have long been seen as constituting
and behaving as voting blocs. The social group officially known as
Other Backward Classes (OBCs), has also been marked by preferential
political choice in many parts of India for decades, leading
to considerable restructuring and reconfiguration of party politics
both at the national and state levels. One important aspect of this
phenomenon has been the rise of state level parties, representing
the “third space” in India’s democratic polity. Although political
mobilization of OBCs around the issue of social justice fizzled out
too early, a few state-level parties arising out of the social justice
movement continued to receive support from sections of OBCs
and did well electorally. But, of late, a new trend seems to have set
in. This paper, based on empirical evidence culled from National
Election Studies (NES) 2 (post-poll surveys) conducted by Centre
for the Study of Developing Societies, demonstrates that at least
in the Hindi belt, OBCs have shifted toward the BJP in a big way,
making it the largest recipient of their votes. The paper argues that
the drift of sections of OBCs away from social justice parties and
toward the BJP has been multi-layered and incremental rather than
accidental in nature and that the 2014 Lok Sabha (LS) election was
the tipping point. Not only has the new trajectory of political behavior
of OBCs introduced a new phase of political competition
and reconfiguration, it appears to have created deep existential crisis
for social justice parties.
Keywords: backwards, constituency, Hindi belt, mobilization,
OBCs, political choice, political restructuring, social group, social
justice, state-level parties, support base, voting behavior
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doi: 10.18278/inpp.3.1.6