After she bulldozed the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) communal laboratory in Kairana by winning the Lok Sabha by-poll by a huge margin, Tabassum Hasan of Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) became the first Muslim candidate to enter the Lok Sabha from Uttar Pradesh since 2014. Despite Muslims accounting for 19 per cent of the state’s total population, UP had created history by not electing a single candidate from the community in the 16th Lok Sabha.
According to a TOI report, she not only received the support of Muslims and Dalits but also from a section of Jats and Gujjars, RLD’s core vote bank, which had drifted towards BJP in 2014. The development is being seen as a “ray of hope” by many Muslims, among them was noted historian Prof S Irfan Habib, who wished that the trend must continue and maintained that democracy should be “inclusive”.
The widow of former Kairana MP Munnavar Hasan and mother of Nahid Hasan, an MLA from Kairana, Tabassum is part of an influential family that enjoys a considerable clout in the region.
Hasan had contested for the first time in 2009 Lok Sabha election on a BSP ticket, months after losing her husband in a car crash in Haryana.
In 2014, the 47-year-old leader stepped aside, paving way for her son Nahid to contest the election on a Samajwadi Party ticket against Hukum Singh. But, Hukum Singh won the election.
Hasan had her revenge in the ensuing Assembly by-poll, which Hukum Singh had vacated. Nahid went on to become the SP MLA by beating Hukum Singh’s nephew Anil Chauhan. He won the seat again in 2017, this time against Hukum Singh’s daughter Mriganka Singh.
The Kairana seat fell vacant after the death of Hukum Singh, whose daughter Mriganka Singh was the BJP candidate. Hasan was then supported by the Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.
In May 2016, Hukum Singh had raised the exodus issue when he had produced a list of 250 families which, he claimed, had left Kairana out of fear of gangsters.
The issue, which kicked up a political storm, later found a mention in BJP’s manifesto for 2017 UP assembly polls, said a report. Even during the Kairana by-poll campaign, both chief minister Yogi Adityanath and deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya repeatedly appreciated their government for creating “an atmosphere of safety in Kairana”.
The fall of BJP’s communal laboratory also signifies an interesting social realignment in western UP. Hasan, a Muslim candidate from a Jat party, has successfully brought together the two communities after the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots which saw 62 people killed and over 50,000 displaced.
The Jat-Muslim bond was stitched by former Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh in the 1970s which stayed strong until the right-wing forces disturbed the region’s communal fabric resulting in the 2013 riots. Four BJP leaders, including former Union minister Sanjeev Balyan, were named accused in the riots.
According to a report, while the saffron brigade tried to polarize the atmosphere by raising Jinnah portrait issue in AMU, rising cane dues not only neutralised its impact but also made farmers rise above the caste and communal divide. There are pending cane dues of over Rs 12,000 crore in UP, Rs 796 crore of this in Kairana alone. RLD vice-president Jayant Chaudhary’s call “Ganna versus Jinnah” hit the right chord with voters as it portrayed that the BJP was desperate for polarisation, while the alliance was rallying behind the plight of sugarcane farmers.
Minutes after her emphatic win, a fake quote ascribed to Tabassum Hasan started making rounds on the internet. But the attempts of the right-wing “factory of lies” were late in the day. “Truth has triumphed over lies and jumlas,” she was quoted by TOI as saying soon after her resounding victory over BJP’s Mriganka Singh by 44,608 votes.
Blowing the poll bugle for 2019, Tabassum said, “Because of its arrogance, the BJP had started claiming that there is no alternative to the party. Our alliance has emerged as a viable alternative and we will ensure that the ruling party bites dust even in 2019.”