That the Hindutva organisations were behind the Anna Hazare's movement against corruption was known all along. But the BJP has now decided to shed its cloak of secrecy and surf the Anna wave with two rath yatras in Uttar Pradesh.
With the BJP's stock being abysmally low in the state, the party bosses hope to turn the tide in the 2012 Assembly elections with the help of Anna chant during the yatras.
Spilling the beans, a BJP leader said, "It is widely known that our various wings were with Anna's movement, which was a huge success against the Congress- led UPA government. But our leadership is not sure of its popularity graph in the state. So they want to assess it in the aftermath of Anna's 13 days of fast." He said the whole idea was to measure the popularity of the party post-Anna Hazare movement.
To be flagged off from Mathura and Varanasi on October 13, the two yatras would culminate in Lucknow on November 21 after criss-crossing almost the entire state.
"The yatra from Mathura to Lucknow will cover a distance of 1245 kms and take 70 hours and the one from Kashi (Varanasi) will cover 1300 kms and take 69 hours," said Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, national vice-president of the BJP, while confirming the yatra plans.
Naqvi is also the in-charge of assembly election management in Uttar Pradesh.
Besides these two big yatras, another 350 small yatras were being planned, he said.
Sources said that while one yatra would be led by former national president of the BJP Rajnath Singh and present vice president Vinay Katiyar, party's national vice-president Kalraj Mishra and Sadhvi Uma Bharti would be at the helm of the other.
"Rajnath is the party's Thakur face in UP, while Kalraj is a Brahmin. But Katiyar and Bharti, who would be teaming up with these two leaders, are vibrant Hindutva faces. They are also OBCs. So they can bring back the post-Ram Janmabhoomi demolition supporters of the BJP and also woo the OBCs," said a BJP leader on condition of anonymity.
According to his analysis, the party needed 33 per cent votes to form a government in the state. Giving a break up of castes, he said while Brahmins accounted for 9 per cent, Thakurs comprised 8 per cent and OBCs 44 per cent of the voters in the state. " Since Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav commands the Yadav vote bank, we can try to win over 35 per cent of the non-Yadav OBC voters," the BJP leader said.
Although a source close to the former party president Rajnath Singh said that the yatras will focus only at the rampant corruption in UP and at the Centre, their starting points were being viewed with apprehension.
After the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya in 1992, the party had given the slogan, "Abhi to ye jhaanki hai, Kashi, Mathura baaki hai" (This is just a glimpse, Kashi and Mathura are still there). Of late, however, the BJP had been insisting that the dispute of temple- mosque at these two places was not on its agenda. But with these two yatras being undertaken before the Assembly elections, a silent revival of the old agenda was being feared.
For the purpose of the yatra, the BJP has divided UP in six regions-Gorakhpur, Varanasi, Lucknow, Kanpur, Agra and Meerut. Besides Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, the party's secretary Santosh Gangwar and Ramapati Ram Tripathi, former president of the UP BJP, have been tasked to visit these regions and to brief the party workers on a programme called "Vijay Sankalp Yatra." All the senior leaders of the party, including national president Nitin Gadkari, were expected to address the rallies in more than 350 Assembly constituencies during the yatras.
"We are chalking out the road map of the yatras and will make it official soon," said the source close to Rajnath Singh.
Vijay Bahadur Pathak, spokesperson of the UP unit of the BJP, said that the aim of the yatras was to "maintain the impetus of Anna's movement against corruption in the Congress-led UPA government." "Now we are in a position to take forward the movement of Anna. He has created tremendous political awareness in the society. The public sentiment is strongly against corruption.
Since the Congress at the Centre and Bahujan Samaj Party in UP are openly involved in various acts of corruption, we can certainly use the moment to our advantage," he said.
"A week before the main yatra reaches a particular Assembly constituency, the local units of the party will start smaller yatras at booth level. Since we will hold rallies in each Assembly constituency, the smaller yatras will ensure the presence of a large number of people there," Pathak said.
At present the BJP has only 48 MLAs in Uttar Pradesh and its electoral prospects appear bleak. Having used the civil society activists to whip up public sentiment, the party is now set to reap the harvest.
SP plans its own roadshow
The rath yatra bug has bitten the Samajwadi Party (SP), too. The party's Kranti rath will roll out on September 12 to muster support ahead of the assembly election.
SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said the party's state president and Akhilesh Yadav will lead the yatra aimed at dislodging the BSP from power.
"Our national president Mulayam Singh Yadav had launched the Kranti Rath Yatra on September 14, 1987. It was a huge success and had united the backwards castes and the minorities.Our state president will repeat the history with another Kranti Rath Yatra and remove Mayawati from power in 2012," Chaudhary said.
"Mulayam had earlier also taken out a cycle yatra. Akhilesh will also launch a cycle yatra after the rath yatra concludes on September 24," he said.
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