Chandigarh: By choosing its state unit chief and Kurukshetra MP Nayab Singh Saini as the new Haryana chief minister, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) once again has banked on the consolidation of non-Jats to win the upcoming Lok Sabha elections as well as retain power in the assembly later this year.

Saini belongs to the Other Backward Classes (OBC) community, which makes up the largest share (40%) of Haryana’s population.

Nayab Singh’s Saini caste alone makes up 8% of the state’s population.

With Saini driving the BJP government in the caste-centric politics of Haryana, it is clear that the party is focusing majorly on OBCs ahead of the polls to counter anti-incumbency from its previous government under Manohar Lal Khattar.

Another sign of the party’s non-Jat consolidation came to the fore when it parted ways with the Jats-backed Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) in the new government under Saini, which is primarily formed with support from independent candidates.

Some JJP MLAs may also defect to the BJP, but it is not yet clear.

The JJP stayed in alliance with the BJP under Khattar for four-and-a-half years before he resigned along with his cabinet on Tuesday (March 12).

The sudden move, though surprising, had been building up for several months.

Sources suggest that the BJP was not confident in replicating its electoral performance in 2019, when it secured ten Lok Sabha seats in the state and later retained power with the JJP’s support in the assembly.its

By changing its chief minister to an OBC face, the BJP thinks it will overcome the previous government’s challenges, especially when such an experiment has worked for it in states like Gujarat in the recent past.

It is learnt that Khattar was also part of the BJP’s non-Jat social engineering, but his growing unpopularity made it tough for the party to match its previous poll records.

Poll experts suggest that the BJP’s Saini formula aims to ensure that non-Jats continue to support the party and that the leadership change is actually an excuse for course correction and intended to hide the party’s past follies.

They believe this may benefit BJP in the Lok Sabha elections, especially when it is leveraging the popularity of the Modi brand to sway voters, but that such gains in the assembly polls later are not yet a done deal.

Haryana’s caste politics

In the caste-centric politics of Haryana, Jats, comprising around 25% of the population, have traditionally played a dominant role for decades, as other non-Jat communities either remained divided or aligned with the Jats.

However, the BJP’s non-Jat social engineering during the Modi era has altered the electoral landscape.

Before Modi, the BJP was seen only as a party of ‘upper’ caste voters and urban voters in Haryana.

But this changed under Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah after the party got a chunk of OBC and Dalit votes in addition to support from the Brahmins, Punjabi and Baniya communities both in the Lok Sabha as well as assembly polls since 2014.

Political analyst Vijay Chauhan, assistant professor at department of political science in the Maharana Pratap National College, Mullana (Ambala), told The Wire that Saini’s elevation is an extension of the BJP’s non-Jat politics, which continues to reward it politically.

According to him, by elevating Saini, the BJP wants to ensure that it repeats its performance in the last Lok Sabha elections, when it won all ten seats in the state.

In the new government formation, Chauhan said that there is a strategy to divide the Jat vote bank, too.

The Jat vote bank in the state is largely divided between the Congress, Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and its splinter group, the JJP. By dumping the JJP and letting it fight alone in the upcoming polls, the BJP is clearly trying to split Jat votes to its favour, he said.

It remains to be seen if all Jat parties come on a common platform to stay in, fight or play on the BJP’s terms, said Chauhan.

Meanwhile, with a Gujarat-like change in leadership, the BJP also eyes electoral benefits beyond the Lok Sabha polls.

It is learnt that the BJP changed the government in Gujarat months before the assembly polls. In Haryana too, it did the same thing with the hope that it retains power in the assembly polls that are slated to take place soon after the Lok Sabha elections.

BJP leaders are already claiming a clean sweep. Karnal BJP MP Sanjay Bhatia told the media that the party is confident of winning all ten Lok Sabha seats in Haryana as well as the upcoming assembly polls.

Meanwhile, JJP state president Nishan Singh informed the media that a decision regarding the alliance with the BJP will be announced tomorrow during a rally in Hisar.

Saini takes oath with independents

Meanwhile, with support from independent candidates, Saini took oath as Haryana’s 11th CM.

The BJP, which currently has 41 MLAs in the 90-member state assembly, needed the support of five more MLAs to retain power.

At least five of six independent MLAs have already extended support to the BJP.

Besides, Sirsa MLA and president of the Haryana Lokhit Party, Gopal Kanda, also extended support to the BJP.

In exchange for their loyalty, one independent MLA, Ranjit Singh took oath as minister along with other BJP leaders including Banwari Lal, Jai Parkash Dalal, Kanwar Pal Gujjar and Moolchand Sharma.

BJP accepted the moral defeat and Khattar’s failure: Congress

Speaking to the media, Congress leader and former chief minister Bhupinder Hooda said that by changing its chief minister, the BJP has accepted its moral defeat besides the failure of its CM.

“The breaking of alliance with the JJP was not surprising. There was an agreement between these two [BJP and JJP] to break the alliance because this alliance has totally failed. This was not a policy-based alliance, it was a ‘thugbandhan’, and people have realised that,” he said.