With a little help from the CPM: Samajwadi Party's extreme makeover

How did a party that had become synonymous with goondagiri reinvent itself?

That’s the question on everyone’s minds as the Samajwadi Party sweeps back into power in Lucknow. Five years ago the party had been decisively humbled. It was down to 97 seats from 143. The 2009 Lok Sabha polls were not much better either. Then in 2010, Akhilesh’s wife Dimple lost a Lok Sabha election to Raj Babbar.

Akhilesh is being projected as the magic wand that turned the party around because every comeback story needs its hero.

But the SP’s reinvention also took some help from its on-off ally, the CPM according to Radhika Ramaseshan in T_ he Telegraph_.

[caption id=“attachment_237168” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Mulayam emulated the Communists cadre-building skills. PTI”]  [/caption]

More from Politics

Is Shashi Tharoor’s breakup with Congress inevitable? ‘Naxalism will end in India by March 2026’: Amit Shah at CRPF Raising Day parade

Ramaseshan says Mulayam emulated the Communists cadre-building skills, taking student politics seriously and creating various departments within the party office including one on research and development. “Mulayam and his son Akhilesh have benefited from the silent work on the ground through a strong party machinery,” writes Vinod Sharma in the Hindustan Times.

That organisational strength came through on Tuesday much to the chagrin of national parties like the Congress who found their state units virtually rudderless. It meant that while the Youth Congress Rahul had been rebuilding was MIA in the campaign, Akhilesh had a whole troop of young leaders who were not running for election, but working for the party. Everywhere Rahul went for a campaign stop, his cadres followed to do a “reality check.” That’s where they found out useful tidbits like Rahul’s colleagues bringing their own food from home during the much touted sleepovers at Dalit homes. “We stressed all this in our campaign,” said Samajwadi student chief Sunil Singh Yadav. “What is the point in saying ‘I have spent nights at Dalit homes?’ It would be more radical for Rahul to invite Dalits to his home and treat them to a meal.”

One other lesson from the CPM’s election planner, says Ramaseshan, was to not allow a poll defeat paralyse it into despair. “Netaji’s diktat was start working for the next election, a day after the results are notified,” said one activist.

What also helped the party give itself a makeover was the removal of Amar Singh who had buddied up to a Bollywood-corporate gang. Akhilesh brought back Azam Khan to woo back Muslim voters who had been deserting the party. At the same time the party quietly outreached to Brahmins upset with Mayawati to quietly create SP’sown “Brahmin-Yadav-Muslim” coalition. The party also gave itself a more pragmatic modern look says Pratap Bhanu Mehta in a blog for FT. “It combined a modernist campaign, centred on promising iPads and English-medium education, with an old style, efficient party organisation rooted in local power structures.” That meant Mulayam quietly dropped his anti-English stance.

The win-win combination was a joint dose of old and new politics writes Akrita Reyar for ZeeNews.com, a balancing act that most media, fixated on Rahul, missed out on. “So you had a promise of 18% reservation for Muslims (beating Congress at it) along with laptops to Class XII pass-outs and tablets for those who clear Class X exams. You may recall, SP, in the 2007 avatar had anathema for all things touched by technology.” It also happily promised dole for unemployed youth and free water and power in the villages as well as fulfillment of the Sachchar Committee and Ranganath Mishra Commission recommendations.

No one knows how the SP plans to pay for any of this. But that’s a story for another day.