Lok Sabha election results 2024: How the BJP lost its Dalit votes

Why did the BJP fail to cross the ‘magic mark’ of 272 needed to form the government?

That’s the question many within the party are asking at this moment.

One major reason being cited is the BJP’s performance with Dalits particularly in the politically crucial state of Uttar Pradesh – which sends the most MPs to Parliament.

But how did the BJP lose its Dalit vote?

Let’s take a closer look:

What happened?

The BJP in 2014 won a mammoth 71 seats in Uttar Pradesh while netting 282 seats – enough to form a government on its own.

Of the 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state, 17 are reserved for the Dalits.

The BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls swept all 17 SC or Dalit-reserved seats in the state.

The party followed up that performance in 2019 by winning an impressive 62 seats.

It won 14 SC-served seats in 2019 while losing Nagina and Lalganj seats to the BSP.

The BJP’s ally Apna Dal (S) won one seat in 2014.

However, in 2024 the BJP’s tally in Uttar Pradesh has been reduced by half – to just 33 seats.

Meanwhile, the Samajwadi Party and the Congress alliance won more seats than the BJP in UP.

The BJP won eight of the 17 Dalit seats – Bulandshahr, Hathras, Agra, Shahjahanpur, Hardoi, Misrikh, Bansgaon and Bahraich.

The BSP, which once reached the pinnacle of politics and power on the basis of Dalit vote bank, got no seats in the state.

Meanwhile, the Opposition parties won nine of these reserved seats with the Samajwadi Party (SP) winning seven seats, the Congress won one and the new “hero” of Dalit politics, Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) chief Chandrashekhar Azad, won from the Nagina constituency.

The SP won Robertsganj, Machhlishahr, Lalganj, Kaushambi, Jalaun, Mohanlalganj and Etawah seats, while the Congress won from Barabanki.

The SP in particular seems to have established a new, broader caste coalition, according to The Conversation.

According to NDTV, Uttar Pradesh witnessed a 19 per cent swing for the Congress and SP.

Meanwhile, the BJP’s vote share dropped by nine per cent, while the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) lost 10 per cent of its votes.

The BSP, which once reached the pinnacle of politics and power on the basis of Dalit vote bank, got zero seats in Uttar Pradesh.

The party won nine per cent of the votes but didn’t win a single seat this time.

In 2019, it had won 10 seats.

Congress leader PL Punia, a former MP and former chairman of National Scheduled Caste Commission, told PTI that last time some SC votes went to the BSP and some went to the BJP. He claimed that this time none went to the BJP and only a limited number went to the BSP.

“This time, the entire vote shifted to INDIA bloc,” Punia said.

Punia was elected Congress MP from Barabanki Lok Sabha constituency in 2009. His son Tanuj Punia, who was once close to Mayawati, defeated BJP candidate Rajrani Rawat by 2,15,704 votes on Barabanki (reserved) seat.

Asked the reason for the Dalits voting for the INDIA bloc, Punia said, “The INDIA bloc promised Rs 1 lakh annually, jobs, unemployment allowance and minimum wage of Rs 400 for the poor families. This was quite effective.”

Others, including some within the BJP, agreed.

“What else explains the victory of Chandra Shekhar Azad, a Dalit leader, from Nagina (West UP) seat? With BSP appearing inactive in these elections, Dalit votes in seats around Varanasi and Faizabad saw this segment shift its vote to Congress and Samajwadi Party,” a BJP leader told Economic Times.

Over in Telangana, the BJP and Congress won eight seats each.

However, the Congress swept all three SC-reserved seats of Nagarkurnool, Warangal and Peddapalli.

Meanwhile, the BRS, which won nine seats in 2019, drew a blank this time.

Experts told The Times of India that though the Dalits supported the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) during the past few polls, they began gathering behind the Congress in the recent Assembly polls.

They blamed many factors such as anti-incumbency, the ₹10 lakh Dalit Bandhu sop not being extended to all, BRS not doing anything on categorisation of SCs as well as several other demands.

In Maharashtra,  Dalits form a notable chunk of vote bank at 10.50 per cent.

The BJP won two of seven seats in Vidarbha, while its Mahayuti ally, the Shinde Shiv Sena lost in all its three seats, as per Indian Express.

The newspaper quoted Maharashtra Deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis as saying post the results: “Unfortunately, the Opposition set a false narrative to mislead the people.”

What do experts say?

The results came as a surprise to many including pollsters who predicted that the BJP would repeat its dominant performance.

But others got it right prior to the polls.

Hakim Sahib, a full-time mendicant and a part-time politician from Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut, told Al Jazeera, “BJP will not win more than 40 seats in UP as there is a strong undercurrent against the party.”

Many on the ground say that the BJP’s ‘400 paar’ statements might have scared off Dalits – who feared the BJP would change the constitution.

Inderjit Singh a teacher in Gorakhpur, a northern UP city, told the outlet, “So many seats slipped out of the BJP fold,” he said.

“They want to change the constitution of India and stop job reservation,” added Gautam Rane, a Dalit activist who campaigned against the BJP.

“The INDIA bloc’s narrative of an overwhelming BJP majority government being a threat to the Constitution seems to have struck home. Voices were heard from Dalit settlements about alterations in the statute created by Dr B R Ambedkar and threat to the protections provided in it for them,” a piece in the Indian Express argued.

“Both these things came from the BJP itself. So the voters became alert that they will not let the Constitution change under any circumstances. This was a big factor. It is well known that the Bahujan Samaj Party has joined hands with the BJP. So the Dalits voted in large numbers for the INDIA bloc. We will live up to their expectations,” Punia added.

Rane told the outlet many voters did not go for the Bahujan Samaj Party – which has long had support of the community – because they felt it could no longer take on the BJP.

During the election campaign, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and SP chief Akhilesh Yadav had alleged that the ruling BJP will change the Constitution and end reservation if the NDA wins more than 400 seats.

A senior BJP leader, on the condition of anonymity, said, “We thought that the traditional vote bank of the BSP is ours as the party is weakening and also because of our distribution of five kg of food grains. But a large number of Dalits came under the influence of the leaders of the Opposition alliance in the name of saving the Constitution and reservation.”

He said its effect was not only on the seats reserved for the Dalits but also on the general seats where the candidates of the opposition parties got the votes of the Dalit.

The INDIA bloc has also made new experiments to woo the Dalits which comprise 29 per cent of the population.

After the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, top BJP leaders were accusing the opposition parties of rejecting the invitation for the consecration ceremony and for being anti-Sanatan.

But in the same Ayodhya, the SP’s strategy of fielding Prasad clicked and he defeated the BJP candidate Lallu Singh, who was a kar sevak of the Ram Mandir movement.

Political analyst and Dalit thinker Rakesh Kumar, a resident of Ghazipur, told PTI that Akhilesh Yadav had certainly taken a big risk by fielding a Dalit candidate on a general seat. But he reaped benefits not only in Ayodhya but also on other seats of the state.

Dr Sushil Pandey, professor of History department in Baba Saheb Ambedkar Central University, Lucknow and author of the book ‘Caste and Politics in Democracy’, told PTI, “It is too early to reach any conclusive point in this, but it cannot be denied that the anger of the voters over the selection of the BJP’s candidates, the slogans about saving the Constitution, protecting reservation and increasing the amount of ration given by the opposition parties attracted the Dalits towards them.”

With inputs from agencies