Sanjay Chauhan, a key element of the backward caste matrix of Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav in the 2022 Uttar Pradesh election, is getting impatient. The chief of the Janvadi Party (Socialist), which claims a support base among the Noniya, Loniya and Loniya Chauhan communities mostly in central and eastern Uttr Pradesh, Mr. Sanjay Chauhan is still waiting for his larger ally to allocate seats to his party even as the other allies such as the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party and the Apna Dal (Kameravadi) have declared their candidates on several seats or have been allotted constituencies.
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Mr. Sanjay Chauhan’s value also stands marginally reduced after senior OBC leader from the same community Dara Singh Chauhan quit the Yogi Adityanath Cabinet and joined the SP recently. Mr. Dara Singh Chauhan will contest the election from Ghosi seat in Mau district.
“For the past four years, I worked on the field and as a result the community which once voted for the BJP, today stands fully with the SP. So, when the voters stand with a party or leader, then expectations of the community towards their leader also increase,” Mr. Sanjay Chauhan told The Hindu.
He said he had submitted to the SP a list of 10-11 seats for his party but was not rigid about the figure or expecting as much. He seeks clarity.
“Our commitment is to form the SP government and remove the BJP. Whatever they [SP] are giving us they should make it clear so I can tell the workers about the situation and ask them to go campaign on the ground,” he said.
Mr. Sanjay Chauhan said he was not considering severing ties with the SP yet but said that if Mr. Yadav did not take a decision soon, then the “discontent” among his workers would increase further. “And I will be compelled to go where my workers and community goes,” he said.
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Born in1975 in Ghazipur, Mr. Sanjay Chauhan holds a post-graduate degree in agriculture from the Allahabad University. After serving as the president of the youth wing of the Rashtriya Chauhan Mahasangh, he launched the JP(S) in 2004. Though the JP(S) has not had much electoral success, in 2012 Assembly election it secured a respectable 2.33% votes (over 1.5 lakh votes) in the 35 seats it contested.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, Mr. Sanjay Chauhan contested as a SP candidate from Chandauli but lost by a thin margin against the BJP’s Mahendra Nath Pandey after securing 4.96 lakh votes. The Noniyas and its connected castes are estimated to be 2.3% of the State’s OBC population, which are together roughly constitute 40-50% in the State. The population of the Noniya Chauhans may not seem significant on their own but they are one of the many smaller clusters of the backward caste vote which the BJP attempts to polarise against the Yadav caste, the core of the SP.
After coming to power, the BJP promoted members of the Noniya Chauhan caste in public life to woo the community. While Mr. Dara Singh Chauhan found a berth in the State cabinet, Fagu Chauhan, who won the 2017 election from Ghosi, was appointed the Governor of Bihar.
Mr. Yadav also tried to mobilise the community and at a rally organised by the JP(S) in November last year in Lucknow, he said that the BJP government had betrayed the Chauhan caste and snatched their rights. He also exuded confidence that on the appeal of his ally Mr. Sanjay Chauhan, they would uproot the BJP from the State in the upcoming election. He promised them “haq and bhagidhari” (due rights and representation).
