After so much travail and struggle, at last the moment arrived that Kanshiram and Mayawati had been waiting for. On June 3, 1995 the governor of UP got Mayawati sworn to the office of the chief minister of the state. Now the challenge was to prove the majority on the floor of the house. Mulayam Singh had cut his own wings by getting his supporters attack and subject BSP members to physical abuse. There was no sympathy for him in any quarter. On the direction of the central government Mulayam Singh government was dismissed by the governor. Mayawati led the minority government.
Meanwhile, Kanshiram had recovered to some extent from his illness. He was happy at Mayawati’s taking over the reins of the state. He reached Lucknow to hear the first speech of his protege as CM. After the speech he congratulated Mayawati and wished her a long tenure as the chief minister of the state.
After assuming the chair of the chiefministership her most ambitious project was to construct a 28 acre Ambedkar Park and Parivartan Chowk in honour of Dalit Bahujan leaders and reformers in the centre of the state capital. It was a monumental visualisation. She declared that grand statues of anti-Brahmin social reformers like Jyotiba Phule, Periyar, Shahuji Maharaj, Baba Saheb Ambedkar and others would be installed to remind people of their contribution to the Dalit revolution. Needed funds were sanctioned and the work started in earnest.
Mayawati stayed in power for 136 days. On October 18, 1995 BJP withdrew its support to her government and ended a period that for most politicians and commentators was a temporary aberration. All the efforts of SP and BJP to break up BSP failed and the state was put under governor’s rule.
Explaining the reasons for withdrawing support BJP leader Kalraj Mishra listed grant of the licences for country made spirit, permission for sale of sugar mills, blasphemy to Lord Rama during the Periyar festival, brazen appointments of officers and politically motivated transfers of officials etc. Most of the charges could not be proved. But BSP being a Dalit movement there were provocative signals against the idols or symbols worshipped by BJP, a party of upper caste Hindus.
Kanshiram ridiculed the charges and the claims of BJP. For him there was impracticability instead of sound logic. Infact, they wanted more share in power than Mayawati was willing to yield.
Fall of Mayawati could be attributed mainly to the reason she refused to make compromises beyond a extent with those who helped her to power. There were a lot of kite flying and rumours flew around like pigeons in the sky of Lucknow. There were canards, speculations and planted stories to belittle BSP.
There was open enmity between Mayawati and the daily ‘Dainik Jagran’. The paper printed a news item claiming that Mayawati had a 12 year old daughter being brought up anonymously. It angered Mayawati. Manuist press was out to assassinate the character of a Dalit leader of weaker sex. In a public rally Mayawati challenged the newspaper to produce that so called 12 year old daughter or be ready to face grave consequences. The owner of the paper was a BJP sympathiser. Some BSP workers reached the news- paper office to demand apology. The newspaper provocatively refused to print apology for printing incorrect news. Infact, the newspaper challenged Mayawati to undergo a medical test to prove that she never mothered a child. However Mayawati used restraint and controlled the anger of her followers who were about to go berserk with violence.
Meanwhile, Mulayam Singh was getting very frustrated at not being able to form government. During his rule he had won over the media through several kinds of appeasements. He asked favoured media persons to create such a rift between BJP and BSP that they may never come together again.
The main mission of Kanshiram was to bring together the untouchable Hindus and Muslim minority. Both these sections were despised by BJP whose main support base was upper caste Hindus of communal mindset. This mismatch was to be highlighted to keep BSP and BJP apart.
During her brief rule, Mayawati had managed to create support base in rural areas and towns. It became apparent when in 1995 in the municipal elections BSP captured a civic corporation, civic committees in towns and 22 small cities.
1996 Lok Sabha elections were very important. BSP was much expanded party now. The political parties were vying for power. At the centre an old tired Congressman in Narsimha Rao was heading the government and losing control over the situation. The grand old Congress party was in bad shape and getting fragmented.
Meanwhile, BJP leader L.K. Advani and some other leaders had got involved in Hawala scandal. It appeared no party would get clear majority. In a hung house small parties and regional outfits could play the role of king makers. The election results shocked Congress. It won only 140 seats. BJP did better by bagging 161 seats but it was still away from power. It could not form a government that could last for long.
To find a way out secular parties hold parleys and Deve Gowda of Karnataka was made PM as compromise candidate. Congress gave support from outside. As a prime minister Deve Gowda came to limelight suddenly and gained popularity.
According to Kanshiram the political instability suited BSP well. It was getting opportunity to broaden its base and entrench itself in traditional support areas.
The observers took BSP to be a novice party yet it gained significant success inspite of fighting elections without any alliance. Lone battle it fought yet won 6 parliamentary seats in UP In vote share, it was significant that BSP got 20% of the total vote share. It was almost equal to the Samajwadi Party. In Punjab and MP too BSP got healthy percentage of vote share. Now everyone took notice of BSP and realised it was an emerging force in the politics of India. Its popularity was on the increase and support base widening.
The popularity of BSP in UP was evident when for the state elections it aligned with Congress. The grand old Congress was forced to play the role of a junior partner to BSP in the alliance. BSP kept 300 seats for itself and gave away only 125 seats to Congress. The confidence of Kanshiram was sky high and he appeared to be the master of the hour. He declared if the alliance came to power Mayawati would be the CM. It surprised the Congress party obviously they were not consulted about it. But its leaders could do little about it.
On the instance of Kanshiram Congress fielded a large number of Brahmins to cut into the vote bank of BJP. But it didn’t work. Infact Congress lost whatever little support it had been left within Dalits and minorities. The Congress workers were shocked.
BSP used its alliance with Congress to upset the apple cart of the central government to which Samajwadi Party was a constituent. Mulayam Singh was functioning as the defence minister. BSP demanded resignation of Mulayam Singh and the publication of the findings of the committee that probed July 2 Lucknow Guest House outrage by SP workers. Prime Minister ignored the demand but BSP kept making noises to worry Mulayam.
UP assembly elections took place in the later half of the year in a very communalised atmosphere whipped up by BJP. The results were disappointing for BSP and Congress. They got 67 and 33 seats respectively. SP got 110 seats and BJP bagged 180 seats out of the total of 425 seats. No party or combination had got majority and the three leading parties were too antagonistic to join hands with each other. UP again went under governor rule.
The results revealed the fact that scheduled castes/tribes were the exclusive support base of BSP. That was its weakness too because Muslims had been weaned away by Mulayam Singh. Upper caste Hindus were now with BJP. The support base of BSP was too uniformly spread out all over. Hence its votes were not getting converted into seats.
Although scheduled classes were primary objective of BSP for upliftment yet other sections and faiths were on its radar for welfare work. Mayawati clarified—
“If we are to define social justice and social change in one sentence, we may say—’Carry the filth and garbage in a cart instead of on the head of an individual’. That would be social justice. We, why only an individual, or one from a community and caste should carry the garbage? Why they only must do the dirty work and not others? That people of only a particular caste must not do it, that signifies social change. I think a person of clean and unprejudiced mindset must understand from the example as to what is the basic difference between social justice and social change or transformation. The perpetuation of the social injustice and barbaric system better known by us as ‘Manuist System’ even in the modern age is social justice for them and social transformation or change calls for elimination of this unjust and barbaric system to replace it with humanist rule and social system based on equality of all and justice.”
After winning over Dalits Kanshiram and Mayawati began to make roads into minorities and create an additional support base.
