A massive, probably tectonic, change in the political balance-of-forces seems to be under way in Uttar Pradesh, the like of which no other state has witnessed. This shift is likely to prove important not just because UP single-handedly determines 15 percent of Parliament’s composition. It’s also because it may influence trends in the Hindi belt, indeed the whole country. I add qualifications like “may” and “likely” because of UP’s highly fluid situation and exceptional difficulties in forecasting voter behaviour there.

The shift lies in the strong forward thrust of the Bahujan Samaj Party, which, according to most opinion polls, will emerge as the single largest in the UP elections, commanding 140 to 155 seats (if not more) in the 403-member Assembly.

Most informed observers of UP expect the Dalit party to form the next government in Lucknow—probably in alliance with a smaller party like the Congress or BJP.

However, the really important issue isn’t whether the BSP comes to power or not. (It has been in government thrice, without remotely nearing its term.) It’s the nature of the social coalition it’s building to extend its support beyond its bedrock-solid Dalit base with a 21 percent population share. The BSP is consciously, deliberately wooing the upper castes, and to a lesser extent, the OBCs by promising them cooperative power-sharing.

Thus, it’s now fielding a total of 139 upper-caste candidates, including 86 Brahmins, 14 Banias and 38 Rajputs, besides 110 OBCs, 61 Muslims and only 93 Dalits. This was not done on the spur of the moment. Mayawati has been planning this for more than two years.

This strategy is apparently working. Many upper-caste politicians, particularly Brahmins, are deserting the BJP for the BSP, according to ground-level reports. These also suggest that a new bloc or coalition is being consolidated, at whose core lies Dalit power. This is transforming the fundamental terms of UP’s electoral competition.

The BSP is trying to co-opt the upper castes, especially Brahmins, on its own terms. This electoral-political phenomenon is without precedent. It’s the exact opposite of what the Congress did in UP in the 1950s and 1960s, and more briefly, in the 1980s, when it built an upper-caste-dominated coalition, which incorporated the “core minorities”—Dalits and Muslims.

It’s also the reverse of what the BJP did in the 1990s by recruiting some OBC support in addition to its upper-caste base—through a combination of mandal (OBC politics) and kamandal (upper caste-oriented Hindutva).

Both these arrangements were dominated by the upper-castes. But the BSP is trying to accommodate non-Dalit groups within a Dalit perspective, and in a coalition dominated by Dalits.

We don’t yet know if the BSP’s upper-caste overture strategy will actually succeed and whether it will win a convincing margin over the Samajwadi Party and its other rivals. But it seems likely, going by recent trends, that the BSP will further improve on its election performance by attracting more non-Dalit support.

The BSP’s electoral record is indeed a story of dizzying growth. It rose from a mere 9.4 percent vote-share and 12 Assembly seats in 1991 to a 23.1 percent vote and 98 seats in 2002. In the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, its vote-share fell just short of 25 percent by 0.3 percent—an impressive performance by any reckoning.

Whatever happens in these elections, the BSP seems to have set a new phenomenon in motion. The fact that upper-caste leaders are seriously negotiating with Mayawati with a reasonable level of comfort despite the current inequality or asymmetry in the distribution of power between the two groups speaks for itself.

None of this should be seen as underestimating the SP, which quintessentially represents OBC power, albeit dominated by more powerful castes like Yadavs. In fact, it’s the SP’s growth in recent years, coupled with, first, the Congress’s rapid decline since the 1980s, and later, the BJP’s erosion beginning in the early 2000s, that has driven the upper castes, especially Brahmins, into the arms of the BSP.

However, the SP’s support-base has significantly eroded in the past couple of years.

This further reinforces the point that the real contest in UP is between the BSP and the SP. This has been the case since 2002, when these two parties together overtook the BJP-Congress and commanded an impressive 48 percent of UP’s total vote and 60 percent of its Assembly seats. By the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, their combined vote-share had risen to 60 percent with 57 of 80 Lok Sabha seats.

Meanwhile, the Congress’s vote-share has fallen from its peak of 51 percent in 1984 to just 9 percent. The BJP’s vote-share peaked at 33.3 in 1993 and declined to 20.3 percent in 2002.

The SP and BSP were—and remain—bitter rivals. But they are now raiding the base—not just of the Congress, but that of the BJP too.

There is another longer-term process in operation in UP, besides the erosion of these Bhadralok-dominated parties. That involves the aspirations of various subaltern, underprivileged or disadvantaged groups to political self-representation through new parties/blocs, rather than through established multi-caste parties.

Thus, first, upper-layer OBCs like Yadavs, Jats, Gujjars and Kushwahas broke away from the Congress. Some coalesced into the SP. A smaller number even moved to the BJP under the spell of Hindutva during the communal Ram temple campaign.

Now, even smaller and lower-caste groups like Kurmis and Most Backward Classes are looking for self-expression and -representation. That’s why the emergence of Sonelal Patel’s Apna Dal and Beni Prasad Verma’s Samajwadi Krantikari Party.

This is leading to political fragmentation, but also to greater representation of the underclasses. All these are forms of identity politics, of group/social class identity assertion and recognition. Identity politics, however progressive and empowering for subalterns, is necessarily limited.

What we really need is the politics of radical redistribution and social transformation, which restructures social relations by levelling hierarchies and extending peoples’ entitlements. However, to the extent identity politics can contribute to radical alternatives, it must be welcomed. UP seems to be going in that direction.