Maurya, Rajnath or Sinha? Speculation rife on BJP's choice for Uttar Pradesh CM

The rise of Keshav Prasad Maurya, from the backward caste of Mauryas, has raised questions

BJP President Amit Shah in an election rally in Amethi

Last Updated : Mar 11 2017 | 1:19 PM IST

Speculations have intensified on who will be Uttar Pradesh's chief minister. A top Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) source told the Business Standard that caste might not be the primary determinant in zeroing in on a name. "There's a lot of talk on the backward castes' consolidation in our favour. But our social engineering has ceased from today after the results have started coming," the leader said.

The debate over whether the BJP's Uttar Pradesh (UP) top job would go to a backward or an upper caste candidate gained currency when the central leaders chose Keshav Prasad Maurya, from the backward caste of Mauryas, to helm the state party last year. Maurya was also placed prominently in the phalanx of the BJP brass in the campaign. It was even assumed that he was a probable candidate for being the chief minister.

Asked if the candidate would be a Member of Parliament (MP) or a legislator, the source said, "I cannot rule out either." The cryptic answer could bring Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh into the reckoning. Singh was the chief minister of UP until 2002 when the BJP lost the election. He has indicated in the past that he was "not interested" in returning to his home state. According to BJP sources, a possible perception about Singh is that he is seen as a "weighty" leader with the potential of emerging as a power centre parallel to the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duo, given UP's primacy in central politics.

Central minister and Gautam Buddh Nagar MP Mahesh Sharma is recognised as another probable candidate, as is Ghazipur MP Manoj Sinha, the junior communications and railways minister.

Another source added a new element to the debate. "PM Modi is from a backward caste and so is Maurya. We should go in for an upper caste CM to keep the caste balance," he said.

Sources privy to the decision-making processes in the top BJP echelon said that, ultimately, Modi and Shah would do what they did when the party won Haryana and Maharashtra. In both cases, they chose to send less known leaders to head the states. ML Khattar was asked to helm the northern state, and Devendra Fadnavis, a Brahmin whose politics first revolved around the Marathas and later the backward castes and Dalits, to head Maharashtra.

Samajwadi Party sources said that Mulayam Singh Yadav was expected to convene a meeting immediately after Holi where the question of Akhilesh Yadav's leadership was expected to be resurrected. "Mulayamji is very upset that the party lost two elections under Akhilesh's leadership. First the Lok Sabha polls and now the Assembly polls. There is a feeling that the party Mulayamji built with such hard work is getting finished now," a Mulayam associate said.