A WILD WIND FROM WESTERN UP

AS THE REGION’S JATS AND MUSLIMS UNITE AGAINST THE CENTRE’S FARM POLICIES, THEY POSE A CHALLENGE TO THE RULING BJP’S PROSPECTS AHEAD OF THE 2022 UP ELECTION

- Ashish Misra

It was Muzaffarnagar that turned the tide in favour of the BJP in Uttar Pradesh in the 2017 assembly election. And it may well be Muzaffarnagar that will prove to be the party’s nemesis in 2022.

On September 5, 150,000 farmers from 13 states, including UP, gathered at the Government Intermediate College (GIC) grounds for a mahapanchayat under the aegis of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), while another 150,000 spilled out on the streets of Muzaffarnagar. On the stage were representatives of 40 farmer organisations, as 1,000 LED screens beamed the proceedings live.

If the BJP thought the farmers’ protests would die a natural death, the six-hour-long mahapanchayat should come as a rude wake-up call. When Rakesh Tikait, national spokesperson of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) and the most prominent face of the agitation, took the stage to launch ‘Mission UP’, urging farmers to expel ‘outsiders’ Yogi Adityanath and Narendra Modi; or when he called for a Bharat Bandh on September 27; or articulated one more time the farmers’ demand to withdraw the three new farm laws and write into law the guarantee of an MSP (minimum support price), it might have all sounded like echoes of a voice heard earlier. It was his concluding statement that marked a new register in this ongoing protest: “Now, we will not let the BJP start another riot,” he declared. “If they divide the people, we will unite them. Now, as before, the slogans of ‘Allah Hu Akbar’ and ‘Har Har Mahadev’ will resonate from the farmers’ platform.”