Lok Sabha Elections 2024: How much tribal vote did BJP manage this time?

Lok Sabha Elections 2024: How much tribal vote did BJP manage this time?

At an election rally in Banswara in southern Rajasthan in late April, with temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius, a crowd of tribals listened intently to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “In 60 years, the Congress has not been able to find a single tribal leader for the post of president…” he said, listing several achievements for tribals, including the election of Draupadi Murmu as president under his BJP-led government.

However, the crowd did not seem to agree with his words. Hundreds of forest dwellers and nomadic communities in the country have now been included in the category of ‘tribals’. The share of tribals in India’s total population is 8.6 percent. They are also the protectors of most of the country’s natural resources. Tribals have been the traditional vote bank of the Congress, but the BJP has been trying to break into it for a long time.

The party has achieved some success in this direction, especially in the states of western and central India. However, the tribals consider themselves distinct in terms of identity and lifestyle. They have been opposing overt and covert efforts to integrate them into the mainstream.

Currently, out of the total 543 Lok Sabha seats, 47 are reserved for ST (Scheduled Tribes). BJP performed brilliantly in 2019 and won 31 of these seats. At the same time, only four seats went to the main opposition party Congress. BJP seems to be in a strong position in 2024 as well.

However, it faces the challenge of dealing with the speculations among the tribals that the party is going to amend the Constitution to end the reservation given to STs and also implement the Uniform Civil Code (UCC). This may threaten their unique identity. The BJP is running various welfare schemes and urban development projects in tribal areas to woo tribal voters. It is also engaged in highlighting the contribution of tribal heroes and honoring them.

Although tribal communities and settlements are present in almost every state, BJP has a strong presence in the entire tribal belt of central India. Its issues are also present there. This belt extends from southern Rajasthan to the eastern belt of Gujarat and the adjoining Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra and the south.

Jharkhand and Odisha in the east, each of which has five Lok Sabha seats reserved for tribals, and Chhattisgarh, which has four reserved seats, also play an important role in the saffron plan to woo tribals. Northeast India and southern states like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana also have a significant tribal population. Regional parties are also in a strong position in all these states.

Grassroots discontent

In Maharashtra, all four constituencies reserved for STs—Palghar, Dindori, Nandurbar and Gadchiroli—are held by the BJP. The Sangh Parivar’s Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram (VKA) also has a strong presence in the state. However, despite better access to education, job opportunities remain few. “Scholarship schemes have ended while recruitment for government and public sector jobs has also gone down,” says Suhas Naik, a Congress leader and vice-president of the Nandurbar Zila Parishad, referring to the sentiments in tribal areas. The number of landless tribals is also rising as development projects, including dams, are being constructed on their land.

The community’s fear of reservation and UCC is also not without reason. For example, Christian tribals who have joined the BJP in Navapur taluka of Nandurbar district in North Maharashtra are angry with the RSS’s demand to exclude ‘converted tribals’ from the ST category. The demand to include the OBC Dhangar Shepherd community in the ST category is gaining momentum in the state, and the BJP is trying hard to woo them. At the same time, the decision to grant ST status (in 2021) to the Maldhari community living in the Gir forests of Gujarat has also created discontent.

Implementation of the Forest Rights Act is an issue in western and eastern Madhya Pradesh as well as many other tribal areas in the country. “The current and previous governments have rejected the claims, so there has been migration in search of jobs,” says Venkat Ramanujam Ramani, a postdoctoral research associate at the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE). “Land fragmentation and lack of water for irrigation are also among the issues affecting the tribals.”

In 2021, the notification of PESA (Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas) Rules protecting tribal gram sabhas in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh was also seen as too late and too inadequate.

Chhotu Vasava, a tribal leader with a strong hold in Bharuch, Gujarat, says every government has treated the tribals step-motherly. “The main power to decide on the use of rural land is in the hands of gram panchayats but it is being constantly weakened. What is the point of installing Sardar Patel’s statue (182-metre-high Statue of Unity) when we really needed a tribal sarovar, which would have been a source of irrigation for us?” Vasava, founder of the Bharat Tribal Party (BTP), asks.

BJP’s counter strategy

On November 15, 2023, Saharia tribal Bhagchand Adivasi of Shivpuri village in Madhya Pradesh got a ‘pucca house’, which was handed over to him by the Prime Minister himself through a remote. Built under the Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) Mission, this house is part of the flagship Rs 24,000 crore Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyay Maha Abhiyan (PM-Janman), which is a big attraction in the Modi government’s plan to woo tribal voters.

The PM-Janman Abhiyan, launched on ‘Tribal Pride Day’ to commemorate the birth anniversary of tribal hero Birsa Munda, has identified 75 tribal communities in about 22,000 villages across the country, which will be at the centre of the PVTG mission. According to a PMO note, this will include ’11 key initiatives being run in 18 states and one Union Territory through nine ministries’. Construction of 4,90,000 houses for tribals at a cost of Rs 2.39 lakh will be part of these major ‘initiatives’.

The central government is also focusing on improving the level of education in tribal areas through the state’s Eklavya schools and VKA-run institutions. The number of Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRS) has increased from 119 in 2013-14 to nearly 700 now, and has become a major electoral weapon for the party.

A note from the Ministry of Tribal Affairs shows that the literacy rate among backward communities has crossed the 70 per cent mark. This is a matter of great joy, but there is also a negative aspect and that is the lack of white-collar jobs. Vijay Singh Chopra of Jai Adivasi Yuva Shakti, an organisation based in Dhar, Madhya Pradesh, says, “Increasing awareness and education levels have given rise to aspirations for a better life. Many people take the path of competitive examinations, but only a few succeed. They return to the village in search of white-collar jobs, but they eventually have to take up farming or open a shop.”

The BJP is also facing a challenge over the controversial Forest (Conservation) Amendment Act, 2023, which came into force in December last year. The amendments made to the Act, which reportedly ease the process for authorities to grant permission to use forest areas for commercial and public infrastructure purposes, could prove to be a hindrance in wooing sections of the tribal community who still live on the fringes of forests.

The party has tried to ease discontent in the states it rules, such as raising wages and bonuses for tendu leaf pluckers (most of whom are tribals) in Chhattisgarh and withdrawing controversial amendments to COTPA (Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act). Of course, the Modi government also has a trump card in the form of Murmu, the country’s first tribal president. The BJP hopes this will help it increase its vote share in Murmu’s home state of Odisha (the president hails from Rairangpur in Mayurbhanj district).

What the election trends say

The election trends seem to indicate that the BJP is in a good position in the tribal areas, especially in view of the recent assembly elections in tribal-dominated states-Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat. Congress is currently the main opposition party in all these four states, but the trends indicate that the situation may change. In fact, in almost all the seats in these states, the main challenge to the BJP is coming from the flamboyant young tribal leaders, who have marginalized the Congress stalwarts.

Take Gujarat, where the BJP has held all four tribal seats since 2014 and the party looks set to repeat its performance. Two young tribal MLAs—Chaitar Vasava of the AAP, who is the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INA) candidate from Bharuch, and Anant Patel of the Congress, who has been fielded by the Congress from Valsad—are hoping to break the BJP’s winning streak. Chaitar is pitted against six-time MP Mansukh Vasava, while Anant is challenging Dhaval Patel, the national social media in-charge of the BJP’s Adivasi Morcha.

The Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP) is also making waves, winning one seat in Madhya Pradesh and three in Rajasthan in the recent assembly elections. The rise of the BAP and its popularity among young tribal voters confirms the general feeling that mainstream political parties have let the tribals down. The BAP has fielded candidates on two reserved seats in Madhya Pradesh—Ratlam and Dhar—but it is making the fastest inroads in Rajasthan.

In Dungarpur-Banswara seat of southern Rajasthan, BAP candidate and Chaurasi MLA Rajkumar Roat is pitted against Mahendrajit Malviya, who left Congress and joined BJP. Former chairman of Dungarpur Municipal Council and BJP leader KK Gupta says that the wave is so strong in some areas that non-tribals are feeling neglected.

He alleged, “We live in constant fear and have little representation in any elected body. We either face harassment or migrate.” According to Gupta, the union’s Rajasthan Vanvasi Parishad is not doing enough to counter the BAP here.

Tribal votes in Rajasthan are also important in the Lok Sabha elections because of the ‘spillover effect’ (the effect of unrelated events in one area on another area) on general seats. For example, Sawai Madhopur-Tonk is a general category seat but it has been represented by MPs from the Meena ST community several times. In southern Rajasthan too, tribal influence extends to three more seats apart from the reserved seats.

Dominance of regional parties

In other states with large tribal populations, regional forces have equal influence. In Odisha, the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) has a strong hold on tribal areas, while in West Bengal, the BJP and the Trinamool Congress are neck-and-neck. The BJP won Bengal’s two reserved Lok Sabha seats, Alipurduar and Jhargram, in 2019, but the Trinamool made a strong comeback in the 2021 assembly elections and won nine seats in the region. In Jharkhand, the five seats reserved for STs may be affected due to the sympathy wave in favour of Chief Minister Hemant Soren’s wife Kalpana and the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) after his arrest.

Meanwhile, the BJP’s relationship with tribals in the Northeast remains complicated. Except for Assam, Manipur and Tripura, the other five northeastern states have a tribal majority population. Conflict between the Kuki and Meitei communities has damaged the party’s credibility in the region, but is unlikely to change voting patterns among tribals in the Northeast.

Tribals in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh, happy with the Modi government’s emphasis on development, are unlikely to change their allegiance. In Manipur, the party is not even contesting the Naga-dominated Outer Manipur seat. Other states will witness a contest between NDA allies and Congress/regional parties. In Tripura, the BJP has allied with Tipra Motha led by royal descendant Pradyot Debbarma, popular among tribals.

The interesting fact that has come out from the reactions received at the ground level is that the tribal voters are not very enthusiastic about the steps like construction of Ram temple and abrogation of Article 370. Even the popularity of Prime Minister Modi does not seem to be a major factor in attracting the voters. The ‘TINA (no alternative) factor’ will work more for the BJP in the region. The opposition party Congress is working hard to regain its tribal strongholds.

Rahul Gandhi often raises the Adivasi (indigenous) versus BJP’s Vanvasi issue, citing it as an example of the “ruling party’s twisted logic to humiliate the community”. It remains to be seen whether such rhetoric will have any impact on the ground, given the ruling party’s strong organisational network.

,With Rahul Noronha, Arkamay Dutta Majumdar, Kaushik Deka, Amarnath K. Menon, Dhaval S. Kulkarni, Rohit Parihar and Amitabh Srivastava

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