As Yogi heads for campaigning in Karnataka, not all is well back home in UP

His Deputy Keshav Prasad Maurya expresses frustration at officials harassing party workers

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath is set to campaign extensively for his party in Karnataka. But not all is well back home in Lucknow.

In just over a year after its emphatic win in Uttar Pradesh, the BJP government is facing an avalanche of criticism and has faced key Lok Sabha by-elections, including Adityanath’s Gorakhpur.

Trouble for Adityanath is that allies and his own party leaders are not mincing words in criticizing his leadership.

On Wednesday, Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya tweeted his disgust at the manner in which the business of governance is being carried out.

“Party workers and supporters didn’t work day and night to merely to form the government to enjoy the fruits of power. They worked to have an honest government dedicated to the welfare of the people. Some officials are misusing their position to harass these workers. This is unfortunate. Amends should be made,” Maurya tweeted.

If sources in Lucknow are to be believed, Maurya is upset at being a figurehead with little real powers and the bureaucracy not heeding his orders. But he is only the latest among party leaders, and allies, who are upset.

BJP’s Dalit MPs are also angry. On April 5, BJP’s Robertsganj Lok Sabha MP Chhote Lal Kharwar complained to Prime Minister Narendra Modi against Adityanath. He said he was scolded and asked to leave when he sought time to meet Adityanath. Subsequently, some other Dalit MPs also criticised the CM.

A common refrain is that after becoming the chief minister, Adityanath has ceased to be a ‘Yogi’, but has turned into Ajay Singh Bisht – the Thakur from Uttarakhand.

Nearly all castes are upset, and as BJP ally Apna Dal’s Anupriya Patel said in Lucknow, officials belonging to Adityanath’s castes are get preferential postings. Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party, also an ally, has also publicly given vent to its ire.

Four BJP legislators have also written to the CM to launch development projects in Badaun in an effort to break the hold of Samajwadi Party (SP) MP Dharmendra Yadav in the district.

BJP MLA Mahesh Chandra Gupta, two other party MLAs and an MLC have written a letter to the chief minister, citing the development projects undertaken by Yadav during the previous SP regime, which they said have won over the constituents here.

"Yadav has been representing the constituency since 2009 and after 2012 when SP came to power, a government medical college hospital, overbridge and bypass, roads and degree colleges were sanctioned at his initiative," the letter said.

"These works by the SP MP have won him the loyalty of the people of the constituency. At present, the BJP has five MLAs of the six assembly segments of Badaun Lok Sabha constituency and despite the party having its government at the Centre and in the state, the importance of Dharmendra Yadav is intact. Therefore, there are doubts whether the BJP candidate will be in a position to win this seat in 2019," the BJP lawmakers said in the letter. The letter requested the CM that his government should undertake development projects in the district.

The BJP leadership, and its rank and file, is rattled after the losses in Phulpur and Gorakhpur, and fear a repeat in the entire state if the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party alliance remains intact.

Adityanath is set to spend at least six days in Karnataka, addressing as many as 5 to 6 meetings a day. The BJP is clearly looking at Adityanath to win over Karnataka on the strength of his polarizing image.

But in Uttar Pradesh, another kind of polarization is taking shape – those who are with Adityanath, and those against him. Unfortunately, the number of those against him is increasing, which should worry the BJP. After all, UP contributed significantly in Modi-led BJP winning a majority in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.