Two UP cabinet ministers and many MLAs from the backward class resign, sight ignorance of Dalits and community welfare by the Yogi government

Minister of Labour, Employment, and Coordination Swami Prasad Maurya resigned on January 11 2022, following him, Minister of Forest and Environment Dara Singh resigned on January 12.

Delhi: The trouble for the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) in Uttar Pradesh (UP) is on the pedestal as two cabinet ministers tendered their resignations. Both the ministers cited that the Yogi government neglected the welfare of the Dalits and backward class in the state.

Swami Prasad Maurya, who resigned on January 11, in his resignation letter to Governor Anandiben Patel alleged the neglect of Dalits, backward, farmers, unemployed and small traders" by the Yogi government.

After Maurya's resignation, Akhilesh Yadav posted a photograph with him on Twitter, welcoming him to the SP fold. "Samajik nyay ka inquilab hoga, Bayis mein badlav hoga (Social justice will triumph, there will be change in 2022)," he wrote.

While there was no immediate response from Chief Minister Adityanath, Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya, in a Twitter post, said: "I am not aware of the reasons for which Swami Prasad Maurya Ji has resigned but it is my appeal to him to sit and talk. Decisions are taken in a hurry often turn out to be wrong."

Four other Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) who are supporters of Swami of in the state were said to have followed suit and quit the BJP. Another MLA, Mukesh Verma has resigned from the party citing the same reasons.

On January 12, Dara Singh Chauhan resigned from his post of the Minister of Forest and Environment in the Yogi Adityanath government. He resigned on Wednesday alleging the neglect of the backward classes and the Dalits by the government.

Chauhan, who served as the Forests and Environment minister, said he had worked with dedication for the past five years but Dalits, the OBCs and the unemployed did not get justice from the BJP government. "It was the poor who had made the government but others took all the advantage in the past five years," PTI quoted him as saying.

Taking to Twitter, the Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav wrote, "Hearty welcome and greetings to Shri Dara Singh Chauhan Ji, the relentless fighter of the struggle for social justice. The SP and its allies will unite and take the movement of equality to its height… Eliminate discrimination! It is our collective resolve! Respect everyone — space for everyone."

Meanwhile, an arrest warrant has been issued against ex-UP minister Swami Prasad Maurya in a seven-year-old case, a day after he left the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Politics in Uttar Pradesh turned towards Mandal and Mandir issue. These have been the ideological poles in UP politics and if Mandal mobilizations helped bring caste identities to the fore and enabled political parties that spoke for the empowerment of Dalits and backward castes to win office, the BJP used the Mandir project to paper over the hierarchies within Hindu society and presented itself as the custodian of Hindu interests.

The interplay of Mandal and Mandir that has defined politics in the Hindi heartland since the 1990s may see a rerun in UP 2022. Meanwhile, amidst all the politics over the mandir, caste, and Hindutva, it was the Dalits and backward class that suffered.

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data for 2020 for crimes against Dalits showed that Uttar Pradesh recorded 12,714 (25 percent) of the total cases. The NCRB data for 2019 showed that Uttar Pradesh accounted for a fourth of all crimes against Scheduled Castes.