Why has Rahul Gandhi raised the issue of caste census, is he eyeing Karnataka or Lok Sabha elections?

Rahul Gandhi, the former national president of the Congress, who was recently stripped of his membership of Parliament and who is campaigning across the country by the country’s ruling party BJP, accusing him of insulting the OBC community, has campaigned for the Karnataka assembly elections. During this, the issue of caste census has been raised.

In a bid to challenge Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Karnataka, Rahul Gandhi has sought to make public the caste-based census data conducted in 2011. Leaders of big and national parties like Congress usually used to refrain from speaking on this issue in such a clear way till recently, but nowadays, in an attempt to do something new and big, Rahul Gandhi has now made his intentions clear regarding caste census as well. have done

In such a situation, the question is arising that what was the need of Rahul Gandhi to go to the land of Karnataka and make this demand? In 2011, Manmohan Singh’s government had to get the caste census done under the pressure of the constituents and the data of which even the Manmohan Singh government of the Congress-led UPA could not be released, why does Rahul Gandhi want to release that data now? After all, why was Rahul Gandhi forced to follow Lalu Yadav’s party Rashtriya Janata Dal on this issue? Did Rahul Gandhi have to chant this tune of caste census and protecting the interests of the OBC community just to win the assembly elections in Karnataka or are its strings going till the Lok Sabha elections to be held in 2024?

In fact, it is absolutely true that the victory or defeat in Karnataka is decided only by the voters of the OBC community, because the number of voters of this community in the state is the maximum i.e. around 54 percent. Most of these people had voted for the BJP in the last election and in such a situation it is believed that the Congress might have got Rahul Gandhi to make this statement regarding the caste census to bring this vote bank into its fold. But the reason is actually much deeper. The OBC community in Karnataka is also divided into different castes and each caste group has its own influential leaders, many of whom are still standing firmly with the BJP directly or indirectly.

In such a situation, it is becoming clear that by raising the issue of caste census, on the pretext of Karnataka, Rahul Gandhi wants to practice the equations of the Lok Sabha elections. In fact, the BJP continues to claim at the national level that after coming to power at the Center in 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has done so many historic works for the OBC people that no previous central government had done. BJP citing several steps like giving constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes, making 27 MPs from OBC community ministers for the first time in the central government and 27 per cent reservation for OBC students in Navodaya, Sainik and Central schools, OBC voters across the country Tries to give this message to the people that only and only BJP can protect the interests of their society.

This is the reason why Rahul Gandhi, who is facing allegations of insulting the OBC community, loudly raised the issue of caste census in Karnataka to break the influence of this propaganda system of BJP. If Rahul Gandhi’s speech is listened to carefully, it will become clear that he was not only addressing the OBC voters across the country from the soil of Karnataka, but was also trying to give a political message to the influential leaders of this community. Were.

Rahul Gandhi had said that if the Modi government wants to do good to the OBCs, then it should make the caste census data of 2011 public so that it can be known how many Dalits, how many tribals and how many OBCs are there in the country. Demanding removal of 50 per cent cap on reservation, Rahul even alleged that Narendra Modi took votes from OBCs, but what did he do for them in nine years?

Actually, this whole fight is for the Lok Sabha elections to be held in 2024. BJP is continuously winning election after election by including the politics of Mandal in Kamandal and therefore Rahul Gandhi is once again trying to change the character of the country’s politics by taking out the genie of Mandal from BJP’s Kamandal. But surely the answer will also come from the BJP. The rest of the final decision will be taken by the people of India only in 2024.

Santosh Pathak

(The author is a senior journalist and columnist.)