Hindutva upsurge in Rajasthan: Will BJP adopt a ‘Yogi Model’ in the West?

BJP’s Hindutva outreach plays out well with all four ‘babas’ winning in desert state. Rajasthan expecting another Yogi Raj like Uttar Pradesh.

All four seers fielded by the saffron party have won in their respective seats; Mahant Balak Nath, called ‘Yogi of Rajasthan’ by his supporters, is the most prominent among them.

Upendra Bharti | HENB | Udaipur | Dec 03, 2023: In the western state of Rajasthan, when BJP candidate from Tijara, Mahant Balak Nath, termed his electoral battle with the Congress’s Imran Khan as a match between India and Pakistan, the Congress alleged “politics of polarisation”. But, ignoring all adversities, Mahant of Baba Mastnath Math, Baba Balak Nath won on December 3 with a commendable margin.

The BJP’s gamble of fielding four Hindu priests in Rajasthan to back its voluble attack on the Congress’s “politics of minority appeasement” seems to have succeeded, with all four saffron-robed candidates – Balmukund Acharya from Hawa Mahal constituency, Mahant Pratap Puri from Pokhran, Baba Otaram Dewasi from Sirohi, along with Mahant  Balak Nath from Tijara- winning the election.

To shun the Muslim appeasement anyway in the election engineering, for the first time ever, the BJP did not field a single Muslim candidate, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi repeatedly accusing the Congress of condoning “riots and terrorism” in his campaign speeches.

At least two of these four seers have fashioned themselves after Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. Among the four, Mahant Balak Nath is being projected as the “Yogi of Rajasthan” since he started his election campaign in Tijara, the seat the BJP won only once between the first election in 1951 and 2018. The constituency, where Hindus constitute around 62% of the electorate with a significant population of Yadavs and Dalits, witnessed a high voting percentage of 86.11 this time. Here, UP CM Yogi Adityanath himself campaigned extensively for Mahant Balak Nath who garnered over 49% votes while Congress candidate Imran Khan received 46.28% votes in a close contest. The Hindu religious leader’s entire campaign revolved around the “polarisation” theme.

Mahant Balak Nath was nominated as Bharatiya anata Party candidate for Lok Sabha from Alwar, Rajasthan and he won the elections in 2019 by defeating Bhanwar Jitendra Singh of Indian National Congress by the margin of 3 Lakh votes. Mahant Balak Nath is the most popular saffron face in Rajasthan as told.

In Pokhran, Mahant Pratap Puri, head of the Taratara Math in Barmer, defeated Congress’s sitting MLA Saleh Mohammad. In 2018, Mr. Mohammad had won by a slim margin of 870 votes but this time round, Mahant  Pratap Puri’s winning margin has been over 35,000 with a vote share of 58%.

Baba Otaram Dewasi, the  Mahant of  Mundara Chamunda Mata Temple, who grabbed headlines as Rajasthan’s first ‘Cow Minister’ in the Cabinet of Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje in 2015, managed to win by over 35,000 votes and defeated Congress’s Sanyam Lodha in Sirohi of South Rajasthan. A former policeman, Dewasi lost to Mr. Lodha in 2018. During his campaign in the tribal-dominated region, Baba Otaram  Dewasi kept telling people that they must grow above party politics and vote for “samaaj” (society). The Devasi Janjati community generally earns their livelihood through rearing cow and other animals.  Top leader of Dewasi  society, Baba Otaram devoted his life for Cow Protection movement.

Of the four seers, the narrowest win was by Baba Balmukund Acharya, the Mahant (head priest) of Hathoj Math. He edged out Congress’s R.R. Tiwari by 914 votes in the Hawa Mahal constituency which has a 34% Muslim electorate. Hawa Mahal, one of the most popular seats in capital Jaipur, was won by Congress’s Mahesh Joshi in 2018 but the party had denied ticket to him in 2023. Mahant Balmukund  is also the head of the All India Sant Samaj Rajasthan. During his campaign, Balmukundacharya claimed that hundreds of temples in Muslim-dominated areas were demolished, as part of a “conspiracy” in Rajasthan. He assured the people that he would identify and rebuild each such temple if voted to power.

Obviously, two major Hindutva factors played a crucial role Hindutva electorates of Rajasthan over the Modi-Yogi factor who came to the state multiple times in their election campaign.   The first one, the murder of Kanhaiyalal, a tailor in Udaipur by two fanatic Muslims in June 2022 who are now out on bail by the grace of Gehlot Govt. And other is, implicating Gau Rakshak (cow protector) Manu Manesar in the murder of Waris Khan, a cow smuggler in Feb this year. The Hindu voters of Rajasthan determined to send a strong message to the Congress Party under which an anti-Hindu Eco-system was soaring high in the Hindu majority state of Rajasthan which has a history to fight against the Muslim invaders and oppresors.

Now in saffronised Rajasthan, the claims of Sadhu Samaj go in favour of these four Seers out of which the claim of Baba Balak Nath to be the next Chief Minister is more powerful for the ‘Yogi Raj’ experiment in Rajasthan like Uttra Pradesh.

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__Inputs from TH and Amar Ujala.