Uttar Pradesh: The importance of being Kalyan Singh in poll year

LUCKNOW: On the evening of July 8, BJP national president JP Nadda and party national general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh flew down to Lucknow for a very special purpose — to meet a frail and ailing former UP chief minister Kalyan Singh, recuperating at the Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS). The two top BJP leaders headed back to Delhi immediately without having any political engagements with the party brass in the state.
This was two days after PM Narendra Modi took out time from his busy schedule — which also included effecting a cabinet reshuffle a day later — to call up Kalyan’s son Rajveer Singh to enquire about his father’s health.The same day, CM Yogi rushed to PGI to meet Kalyan, fondly known as ‘Babuji’. Yogi again paid a visit to meet Kalyan along with his two deputies — Keshav Maurya and Dinesh Sharma — when Nadda and Santhosh reached Lucknow.
On Friday, Modi again called up Kalyan’s grandson, Sandeep to know about his grandfather’s well being. The PM then tweeted: “I am deeply touched that during his conversation with Nadda ji, Kalyan Singh ji remembered me. I also have many memories of my interactions with Kalyan Singh ji. Several of those memories came back to life. Talking to him has always been a learning experience.” In another tweet, Modi said: “Countless people across India are praying for speedy recovery of Kalyan Singh ji...”
While Modi’s personal outreach to enquire about Kalyan’s health and visits by other senior BJP leaders were accounted as courtesy calls, experts did not miss the chance to read into the deeply embedded message — Kalyan’s close association with the Ram Temple movement, which helped BJP rise powerfully in country’s most politically crucial state of UP in early 1990s. The issue has gained all the more prominence with the construction of Ram Temple turning into a reality even as UP heads for a high stake UP assembly election due next year.
In fact, during his first tenure as UP CM, Kalyan attained the sobriquet of ‘Hindu Hriday Samrat’ after a frenzied mob of ‘Kar Sewaks’ hammered down the disputed Babri mosque in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992. A senior BJP leader recalled how Kalyan became one of the most prominent faces of the party in UP at the peak of Ram Temple movement which attained decisive traction after BJP stalwart Lal Krishna Advani embarked on a Ram Rath Yatra.
It was a huge political move of the saffron party to consolidate Hindu community which got divided in the wake of implementation of Mandal Commission report — envisaging 27% reservation to the OBC — by the National Front government led by Vishwanath Pratap Singh at the Centre in 1991. The man behind managing the Rath Yatra was none other than Modi.
Not surprising, the political scales of BJP soared from 57 seats in 1989 to 221 in 1991 in the undivided UP which then had 425 assembly seats. BJP strength kept flickering at 177 in 1993 and 174 in 1996 despite the strong emergence of two regional satraps — the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.