Telangana Elections 2023: Will Modi's Dalit outreach help BJP?

Telangana Elections 2023: With successive governments at the state and Centre failing them, PM Modi’s show of empathy to a community leader projected all the right optics.

A show of empathy by Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on full display when Krishna Madiga, an iconic figure in the Madiga SC community, broke into tears at a massive BJP rally a few days ago in Hyderabad, Telangana’s state capital.

Madigas, (their North Indian parallel is the Chamar/Jatav community), are one of 59 sub-castes within SCs in Telangana. They make a living by engaging in leather works. Hugging an emotional Krishna Madiga, who has been crusading for a quota within Scheduled Castes (SCs), Modi was seen comforting him, wiping his tears and gently patting him on the shoulders.

Madiga Tryst With Sub-Categorisation

Krishna made a dramatic appearance in saffron politics a decade ago when he backed the

Narendra Modi-led BJP in the 2014 elections to get his Madiga sub-categorisation demand included in the party’s manifesto then. Yet, nothing came forth in the last nine-and-a-half years of NDA rule even as PM Modi is poised to run for office for the third time.

Given this backdrop, Krishna, founder of the Madiga Reservation Porata Samithi (MRPS), of course, has reason to lament at the delay. His demand for sub-categorisation of his Madiga community dates back nearly three decades.

The MRPS was founded in 1994 by Krishna Madiga with a motto to seek its pound of flesh in the SC quota. Between them, the Malas and Madigas dominate the SC grouping. While Malas are predominant in Andhra Pradesh, it is Madigas with 60 percent of the SC population who dominate the scene in Telangana.

Malas are considered as a forward community within SCs in terms of literacy and employment over the Madigas for which Malas are accused by Madigas of “hijacking” the benefits of reservations.

Krishna Madiga’s demand began to gain traction two years later when the then Naidu-led TDP government of undivided Andhra appointed the P Ramachandra Raju commission that eventually led to passage of a bill in the state assembly in 2000, sub-categorising SCs into A, B, C and D groups.

The poor show of the Naidu-led TDP in the 1996 general elections had served as a catalyst for the SC sub-categorisation. In that election, the first electoral battle for Naidu since he upstaged his mentor NT Rama Rao in a palace coup in 1995 and took over the party reins, his party secured just 16 out of 42 Lok Sabha seats.

The poor show was attributed to the SCs remaining as a solid vote bank for the Congress which bagged 22 seats. Naidu, who was then desperately in need of an image makeover to rid himself of the usurper tag, apparently hit upon an idea to wean a section of SCs away from the Congress fold. Thus, he acceded to Krishna Madiga’s demand.

Headache For Post-2004 Governments

The SC sub-categorisation thus became a reality, but it stayed in force only between 2000 and 2004. That is when it got struck down by the Supreme Court as an offshoot of a counter movement launched by the Andhra Pradesh Mala Mahanadu against SC sub-categorisation.

The YS Rajasekhar Reddy government that came to power in 2004, passed a bill in the assembly again seeking to restore the sub-categorisation. The UPA-I government, upon receiving the bill from the Andhra government, appointed a national commission headed by Usha Mehra, a former judge of Delhi High Court, which submitted a report in 2008.

The Madigas thus became a bone of contention in the power play between the TDP and the Congress for nearly two decades. Later, following Telangana creation, it was the turn of the KCR’s TRS to attract Madigas by passing the sub-categorisation bill in the assembly twice and even leading an all-party delegation to the Centre.

BJP’s Triple M Strategy

As the elections draw closer in Telangana, the BJP headed by Narendra Modi has now joined the race with his “Triple M” plan which aims to bind the Munnuru Kapu and Mudiraj caste groups from OBCs and the Madigas. Incidentally, KCR has alienated these three predominant caste groups. Mudiraj and Munnuru Kapus are hurt because KCR ousted from BRS their respective big leaders Etela Rajendar and Dharmapuri Srinivas; and, Dalits because he failed to keep his promise of making a Dalit CM.

Eventually, these sections were left with getting closer to the Congress. At a time when the BJP is fast ceding its space to the Congress as the main challenger of KCR, it remains to be seen whether the Modi’s so-called Triple-M plan will benefit BJP or KCR by cutting into Congress votes.

It also appears to be a daunting task for the saffron party to win over Madigas as the expulsion of its former all-India president Bangaru Laxman, who hailed from the Madiga community, on charges of swindling party funds to the tune of Rs 1 lakh and his subsequent incarceration are still fresh in their minds.

Gali Nagaraja is a senior journalist, formerly associated with The Hindu, The Times of India, and Hindustan Times for over three decades. Views are personal, and do not represent the stance of this publication.