Uttar Pradesh: With eye on BSP’s core vote, Congress to start mega outreach campaign for Dalits

Lucknow: Upbeat over the disappointment of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) core vote bank from its leader Mayawati, Congress in Uttar Pradesh is planning big to woo Dalits.

After appointing former BSP MP and a well-known Dalit leader Brijlal Khabri as its UP Chief, Congress has decided to launch a mega outreach campaign for Dalit voters. With an eye on 2024 parliament elections, Congress has drawn a strategy to launch the campaign in the entire state. In its outreach campaign, Congress would only tap Dalit voters in all the 402 assembly segments of state. The ten-day long campaign is to be handled by Dalit and backward leaders of the party only. The campaign would begin at the end of this month after the exercise of the election for Congress national president is over. The campaign is likely to conclude in November this year.

Giving details of the campaign, a senior UP Congress leader said that in every assembly segment ten Dalit voters would be approached every day. One dedicated party leaders would be dispatched in every assembly segment who would approach Dalits. The target persons whom Congress would approach in this campaign could be lawyers, teachers, NGO workers, former BSP workers, or sympathizers. In ten days during the campaign, congress would approach 100 persons in each assembly segment. The party leaders entrusted with the task of carrying out the campaign would be given proper training.

Organizational Secretary of UP Congress, Anil Yadav informed that before the campaign begins, a daylong training session would be organized. In the training session, experts in the field of Dalit politics and senior leaders would apprise the campaigner about the questions he could face while approaching Dalit voters. Yadav said that the core voter of BSP is disappointed and dejected with the way its leader Mayawati has been handling the problems related to Dalit community. He said that Dalits have been core voters of Congress earlier and might come back to its fold if approached properly. He said that the newly appointed Congress Chief of UP Brijlal Khabri has spent several years in mobilizing the Dalit community while being in BSP and this could be of great help to the party.

It may be mentioned that besides appointing former BSP MP as party chief, Congress has given key positions to the leaders who were loyalists of Mayawati once. Former ministers in Mayavati's cabinet Nakul Dubey and Naseemuddin Siddiqui have been made zonal presidents of Congress recently.