New Delhi, Dec 4 (IANS): A 'Brahmin Security Force' has been formed by Congress leader and former Union Minister Jitin Prasada to protect Brahmins from onslaughts and also to fight for their rights and empowerment.
The announcement by Prasada was made in Uttar Pradesh's Farukkhabad on Thursday during a community event that he chaired.
Speaking to IANS, Prasada said: "For overall development of Brahmins and to fight for their rights from jobs to education and more importantly for political empowerment, this organisation has been formed which will work under the Brahmin Chetna Parishad."
According to Jitin Prasada the community has been disempowered under the BJP regime and has to fight back to regain its position in the state.
The Congress leader belongs to the same community and is trying to organise the Brahmins who have been traditional BJP voters except on a few occasions. The 11 percent population is kingmaker in the state and all political parties vie for this vote bank.
The Brahmins prior to the emergence of the BJP had been voting for the Congress but with the rise of Hindutva, the Brahmins have largely moved to the BJP except in 2007 when it voted for the BSP as its leader Satish Chandra Mishra was able to unite the Brahmins with the Dalits and catapulted the BSP to power. But the BSP could not maintain its hold on the Brahmins and they slipped into the hands of the BJP.
But since 2017 when the BJP took power, the Brahmins have been marginalised, alleged Prasada. However the BJP has rejected the charge of bias.
But the BJP is more interested in an umbrella Hindutva vote bank rather than appeasing a particular community, said an analyst. The Congress which ruled the state till 1989 had Brahmins, Dalits and Muslims as its core voters, who have moved in three directions leaving the party in single digits in the assembly.
Since 1989 when the Congress had its last government and the last Brahmin Chief Minister in ND Tiwari, the BJP has held the state many times, while the BSP and the SP also formed the government but no Brahmin could reach the top post.
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