Until a decade ago, few would have heard of Sanjay Nishad, Mukesh Sahani, Krishna Singh, Om Prakash Rajbhar or for that matter, even Anupriya Patel, currently a Cabinet Minister in the Union government. But today, there is a huge, consuming interest in these leaders, who head a cluster of “small parties” that have come to significantly influence the shaping of U.P.’s political landscape, especially in the Poorvanchal region. The poverty-stricken eastern region goes to the polls in the last two rounds of voting coming up on Thursday and Monday.
In 2017, these less-known parties, which mostly provide representation to the numerically significant non-Dalit most backward castes (MBC), assembled under the giant umbrella of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), helping it ride to a spectacular electoral triumph. Cut to 2022, however, and several of them have switched their support, opting to go instead with the Samajwadi Party (SP) led by Akhilesh Yadav, who has become the most formidable challenger to incumbent Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
Forging alliances
