by Faisal Fareed
Daijiworld Media Network - Lucknow
Lucknow, Nov 13: Chief Minister Mayawati once again embarked upon the much hyped 'social engineering' formula of luring the upper caste hindus-brahmins on Sunday.
With an eye on elections, the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) organised a Brahmin Brotherhood convention in Lucknow on Sunday.
On the occasion, Mayawati demanded reservation for poor from the upper caste mainly brahmins and assured to fulfill the promise if voted to power second time. Further playing the caste card very shrewdly Mayawati lashed out at Congress and Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) for not projecting a brahmin as a chief minister. "The Congress will hand over the state to Digvijay Singh and BJP to Rajnath Singh, both are thakurs and not brahmins," said Mayawati. Her statement aimed at taking advantage of ongoing rift between Thakurs and Brahmins the two upper caste among hindus in the state.
"Only BSP serves the interest of brahmins. They are given their due share and respect. They are given adequate participation. I have personally written to Prime Minister (PM) for reservation to poor among the upper caste including brahmins," she said.
CM Mayawati has played the brahmin card successfully in 2007 elections. Her 43 legislators are brahmins in the 2007 elections which gave her absolute majority. The brhamins were also rewarded with plum posts. One national general secretary and Mayawati's close aide Satish Chandra Mishra was given due importance. There were reports lately that brahmins are being ignored in the BSP rule and Mayawati again struck back with a bang announcing that she stands all for brahmins.
The old formular will be again put to test during the 2012 elections.
CM Mayawati during her address also recounted that she had given government posts to two sisters of Satish Chandra Mishra and ticket to wife of energy minister Ramveer Upadhyay only because they were hard and diligent. "Our party believed in sarvjan hitay and sarvjan sukhay, we do not believe in caste politics. We work for the upliftment of all
castes," she send to give a signal to everyone to pull up their socks for coming electoral battle.