Modi rallies & Shah pep-talks to axe for Bhojpuri star Pawan Singh — how BJP’s handling Rajput rebels

New Delhi: From Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat to Bihar and Rajasthan, the BJP has been busy putting out Rajput rebel fires this election season. While negotiations have worked in some cases, at other times the party has had to use the stick, like expelling Bhojpuri singer-actor Pawan Singh today.

Initially given a BJP ticket from West Bengal’s Asansol, Pawan Singh declined to contest in the wake of criticism over his raunchy songs. Now, the Rajput troublemaker is running as an Independent against Union minister Upendra Kushwaha in Bihar’s Karakat Lok Sabha. This contest, which influenced the Kushwaha versus Rajput dynamic in several other constituencies as well, led to mounting calls within the BJP for his expulsion.

In a terse letter Wednesday, the party finally severed ties with him for engaging in “dal virodhi” (anti-party) activities. A Narendra Modi rally on 25 May is also expected to smooth over ruffled feathers, party sources in Karakat said.

Elsewhere, rebel Ravindra Singh Bhati contested against BJP Union minister Kailash Choudhary in Barmer, attracting thousands to his rallies and drawing comparisons to Sachin Pilot. The BJP, however, had better luck in UP’s Jaunpur, where notorious Thakur leader Dhananjay Singh’s wife Shrikala was gearing up to contest against BJP’s Kripa Shanker Singh on a BSP ticket. After parlays with Home Minister Amit Shah, she withdrew from the contest, and Dhananjay Singh announced his support for the BJP.

Meanwhile, the BJP has also been fending off boycott calls from Rajputs in different regions, for reasons ranging from lack of representation for the community in western UP to ‘incendiary’ remarks made by Rajkot candidate Parshottam Rupala in Gujarat.

However, a senior BJP leader downplayed the impact, stating that Rajput anger was mitigated by prominent leaders from the community within the party’s power hierarchy, including Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. He also noted that when Vasundhara Raje was not appointed CM in Rajasthan, Diya Kumari of the Jaipur royal family was elevated to Deputy CM.

“The BJP has balanced caste representation in its power structure. The incidents being seen are isolated and should not be viewed as a combined expression of anger,” he said.

However, another senior Rajput BJP leader from Rajasthan acknowledged various factors feeding into the community’s anger, including the growing dominance of OBC politics.

“Rajputs no longer play a decisive role in determining ticket distribution (in Rajasthan), unlike during the time of Vasundhara Raje and Bhairon Singh Shekhawat,” he said. “Even leaders like Rajnath Singh and Yogi Adityanath can’t decide tickets as they might have done earlier.”

Rumblings from Gujarat to UP

The BJP Rajput challenge in this Lok Sabha election began in Gujarat when Union Minister Parshottam Rupala, the party’s candidate from Rajkot, caused a furore with his remarks at a Dalit gathering in March.

“Maharajahs bowed down to the British, broke bread with them, and even married their daughters to them, but our Dalit community neither gave up our religion nor made any relations with them, we are the true inheritors of Sanatan dharma,” he said. A video of his statements went viral, causing immediate backlash from the Kshatriya community, who demanded Rupala’s candidacy be withdrawn. When the BJP refused, community leaders united to call for the BJP’s defeat in about 10 seats.

Although Rupala has apologised multiple times, and Rajput ‘royal’ Diya Kumari was brought in from Rajasthan to campaign for him, the long-term impact remains to be seen.

On the opposite side of the country in Rajasthan, the BJP faced another Rajput challenge with rebel Ravindra Singh Bhati contesting against BJP Union minister Kailash Choudhary in Barmer. Despite efforts to convince him to withdraw, Bhati did not back down, prompting the BJP to deploy a battery of leaders to campaign for Choudhary.

The trouble continued in Uttar Pradesh, with restless Rajputs causing problems for the BJP despite Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath being from their community. The party’s decision not to give a ticket to incumbent Ghaziabad MP Gen VK Singh, and initially fielding only one Rajput face in western UP, led to public meetings and protests calling for the BJP’s defeat last month.

Even Sangeet Som, a BJP firebrand Rajput leader, took potshots at Union Minister Sanjeev Balyan, a Jat, who is contesting from western UP’s Muzaffarnagar Lok Sabha seat. The Jat-Rajput feud led Adityanath to intervene and address a rally with Som in Muzaffarnagar last month to calm Rajput anger.

In other damage control efforts in UP, the BJP fielded Rajput state minister Jaiveer Singh in Mainpuri to contest against Samajwadi Party’s Dimple Yadav, and another Rajput leader, Dinesh Pratap Singh, will be taking on Rahul Gandhi. Another Rajput leader, Dinesh Pratap Singh will be taking on Rahul Gandhi in Raebareli.

But the embers of discontent still seem to be burning. Earlier this month, while campaigning for his son in Kaiserganj, controversial MP Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh criticised CM Adityanath’s “bulldozer policy,” saying people build their homes with great effort and he understood their pain. “I will continue to oppose the bulldozer policy, and if telling the truth is rebellion, I am a rebel,” Brij Bhushan added.

In another instance, Brij Bhushan referred to Arvind Sharma, former PM principal secretary and now energy minister under Yogi, as “Yashvi Mukhyamantri” (CM) during a rally. He later claimed it was a slip of the tongue, but it created a buzz, especially with Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal also speculating that Modi-Shah would replace Yogi within two months of winning the election.

Rajput strongman Raghuraj Pratap Singh, aka Raja Bhaiya, also added to the confusion among Rajput voters by asking his supporters to vote based on their “preferences” in the Kunda constituency after meeting with Amit Shah. This move was interpreted as rallying support for the Samajwadi Party.

Rajputs vs Kushwahas in Bihar

In Bihar, the BJP faces another knotty Rajput tangle with Pawan Singh, a Bhojpuri actor-singer who joined the party in 2017. Initially announced as the BJP candidate from Bengal’s Asansol in March, Singh later declined to contest after the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress and its supporters raised objections to his “vulgar” songs.

“BJP leaders persuaded Pawan Singh to contest from Asansol. However, he was eager to contest from his own state and Bhojpuri-dominated constituencies of Ara, Buxar, or Karakat. But BJP did not give him a ticket from any of these seats,” said a Bihar BJP leader. “So, he decided to contest as an independent candidate against Upendra Kushwaha in Karakat. Among Bhojpuri-speaking voters, Pawan Singh is a star.”

The BJP’s appeals to Pawan Singh to back down from contesting against NDA candidate Upendra Kushwaha, chief of the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party, fell on deaf ears, leading to his expulsion Wednesday. The constituency votes on 1 June.

Kushwahas, a sizable backward caste after Yadavs in the OBC category, make up about 6 percent of Bihar’s population. The NDA is trying to keep the Kushwahas close, especially since the opposition Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) is fielding seven candidates from the community—traditionally voters of the Nitish Kumar-led JDU, also part of the NDA.

In Karakat, where party preferences vary but the winners have always been from the Kushwaha community since the constituency’s creation in 2009, this dynamic is especially important. Upendra Kushwaha won in 2014 but lost in 2019 to JDU’s Mahabali Kushwaha. This time, both NDA’s Upendra Kushwaha and the INDIA bloc’s Rajaram Singh (of the CPIML) are from the Kushwaha community. Here, Rajput Pawan Singh’s presence is being seen as a threat to the NDA’s prospects.

Karakat’s voter base includes 1.25 lakh Rajputs, 2 lakh Yadavs, 2 lakh Kushwahas, 50,000 Bhumihars, and 75,000 Brahmins. The presence of two Kushwaha candidates could split the Kushwaha vote, complicating matters for Upendra Kushwaha. Three assembly segments—Dehri, Nokha, and Karakat—are Bhojpuri-speaking areas, where Pawan Singh has been trying to capitalise on his popularity.

“The Kushwaha factor can potentially spoil or confuse BJP voters not only in Karakat but also in adjoining seats,” said a BJP district leader from Karakat. “Kushwaha voters in Arrah have been saying they will support (BJP candidate) RK Singh only if Pawan Singh is expelled. Many believe that he is backed by BJP to spoil the chances of Kushwaha.”

Having severed ties with Pawan Singh, the BJP is also hoping to mollify the community through Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s upcoming rally in Karakat on 25 May.

“People have taken enough selfies with Pawan Singh, and now the buzz around him is dying down. The time has come for hard politics and we are confident that people will vote for PM Modi,” said Siddharth Shambhu, Bihar BJP vice president and the in-charge of four Lok Sabha seats, including Karakat.

Sushil Chandravanshi, BJP district president of Karakat, also expressed his confidence that Modi’s presence would stamp out the Pawan Singh factor once in for all.

“After 25 May, everything will change in Karakat and all the BJP votes will shift to Upendra Kushwaha,” he said. “Pawan Singh has no party structure to get votes.”

(Edited by Asavari Singh)