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COVER STORY SEPTEMBER 04, 2026 | The Indian Eye 5

vation and caste discrimination can March 11, 2026 verdict concerning
overlap, but they are not identical OBC creamy-layer criteria, alleging
forms of disadvantage. that the government is attempting
This debate assumes particular to delay implementation and deny
importance in Uttar Pradesh, where benefits to eligible OBC candidates.
the BJP has spent more than a decade These arguments allow the Oppo-
constructing one of the most success- sition to present the BJP as being
ful caste coalitions in contemporary caught between an increasingly vocal
Indian politics. The party’s rise in the anti-reservation constituency and the
state was not based solely on its tra- constitutional beneficiaries of affir-
ditional upper-caste support. It ex- mative action.
panded aggressively among non-Ya- For the BJP, therefore, the chal-
dav OBC communities and sections lenge is not simply whether reserva-
of non-Jatav Dalits, creating a broad tion should exist. It is how the party
social coalition that helped it dom- manages competing expectations
inate state and national elections. within the social coalition that has
That coalition, however, re- powered its electoral success. There
quires constant political manage- is clearly political space for discuss-
ment. The BJP needs its upper-caste UP deputy chief minister Brijesh Pathak (center) with Harsh Dubey (right) at their joint press ing reform, including questions sur-
base, which remains an important conference in Lucknow (Agency photo) rounding the creamy layer, the dis-
part of the party’s organizational and tribution of benefits and whether the
electoral strength, but it also needs poorest sections within reserved com-
OBC and Dalit voters who have be- tember 5 peaceful march in New nity. If such issues begin to converge, munities receive adequate access.
come central to its electoral strategy. Delhi, involving families of deceased political movements can acquire a There is also political space for dis-
Reservation sits directly in the mid- NEET victims, victims of alleged constituency that is not confined to cussing economic disadvantage and
dle of that equation. A party that police brutality, students and youth one caste or one policy question. the concerns of young people who
appears too sympathetic to anti-res- organizations, shows how different The Opposition, meanwhile, feel excluded from opportunities.
ervation demands risks alienating grievances can be brought togeth- is attempting to exploit the other A demand to abolish reservation,
Dalit and OBC voters, while a party er under a generational political side of the reservation debate. Con- however, occupies an entirely differ-
that completely ignores opposition narrative. The CJP has accused the gress president Mallikarjun Kharge ent political category. It would risk
to the existing system risks allowing government of failing to honor com- has accused the Modi government reopening the deepest fault lines in
dissatisfaction among sections of up- mitments made to young people and of attempting to end reservations India’s caste politics and could pro-
per-caste youth to harden into an or- said, “Our patience cannot be mis- “through the back door”, pointing vide the Opposition with a powerful
ganized political movement. taken for weakness. Our good faith to vacant government posts and the mobilization issue among SC, ST and
This explains the significance of cannot become an opportunity for growth of contractual employment. OBC voters. For the BJP, particularly
Nadda’s meeting. It gives the BJP the Government to betray the young “To end reservations, it’s not nec- in Uttar Pradesh, that would be an
a way to acknowledge the grievanc- people of this country.” essary to amend the Constitution unnecessary political gamble.
es without accepting the protesters’ The significance of this new pol- — just eliminating jobs with reserva- The more likely strategy, there-
most fundamental demand. Dia- itics lies in its ability to move beyond tions is enough,” Kharge said, argu- fore, is engagement without endorse-
logue allows the party to keep the traditional caste mobilization. Reser- ing that vacancies and the decline of ment. Nadda can meet the activists
issue within a political framework vation can become one component of a permanent employment undermine and hear their grievances, while
where possible reforms can be dis- much wider narrative involving unem- the practical value of reservation. leaders such as Paswan can reas-
cussed, while statements such as Pas- ployment, education, competitive ex- Congress MP Manickam Tago- sure reserved communities that their
wan’s make clear that abolition is not aminations, government recruitment re has also attacked the Centre over constitutional protections will not
the government’s position. and perceptions of unequal opportu- its position on the Supreme Court’s be dismantled. This dual approach
The rise of the Reservation Ha- allows the BJP to keep communica-
tao Andolan is also part of a broad- tion open with upper-caste and youth
er transformation in how political constituencies without surrendering
movements are organized. Accord- the broader social coalition it has
ing to the material supplied, the spent years building.
RHA’s official Instagram page has The larger political ques-
5.6 million followers and has rapid- tion is whether movements such
ly gained traction by adopting mo- as the RHA and CJP can convert
bilization tactics associated with the social-media popularity into sus-
Cockroach Janta Party, or CJP. This tained organization and elector-
digital infrastructure is important al influence. If they succeed, they
because it allows political anger to could introduce a new dimension
move much faster than conventional into Indian politics in which caste
party organizations can respond. A remains important but is increas-
movement does not necessarily need ingly intertwined with questions of
a traditional cadre, office network merit, employment, economic disad-
or established political leadership to vantage and access to opportunity.
build a large following when social For the BJP, that possibility
media can provide a direct channel makes the anti-reservation move-
to millions of young people. ment impossible to ignore. But its
The CJP itself illustrates the electoral arithmetic also makes it im-
emergence of a new form of youth Reservation Reform Alliance (RRA) members stage a protest in New Delhi (ANI Photo) possible to embrace the demand to
politics. Its announcement of a Sep- abolish reservation.

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