One can call it the Mayawati effect. While the CPI(M)’s new-found proximity with the BSP at the Centre may have been driven by circumstances and the Samajwadi Party “betrayal”, the party has realised the value of her brand of politics. Waking up to the threat posed by caste-based parties to its working class mass base in strongholds, the CPI(M) has been taking steps to strengthen its backward support.

State units of the party have been directed to organise special conventions of Scheduled Caste communities. In Kerala, one of the CPI(M) strongholds, district committees are organising such meetings at the district and even panchayat level. Three district-level conventions are already over and the rest will be completed in a month. In August there will a state-level convention, attended by party general secretary Prakash Karat.

It’s not the first example recently of the CPI(M) taking up the Dalit cause. The images of Karat himself leading partymen in breaking down a wall in a Tamil Nadu village that segregated the Dalit community from the rest are still fresh on minds. The party also did a survey on discrimination against Dalits not so long back.

Interestingly, it is the BSP that is making strong inroads into the CPI(M)’s traditional vote bank in Kerala with high-voltage campaigns in Dalit colonies across the state. More than 50,000 people attended the rally addressed by BSP supremo Mayawati in Thiruvananthapuram recently. The BSP got more than 1 lakh votes in the last state Assembly elections.

The Congress too has been trying to win over Dalits in the state. Party president Sonia Gandhi attended a Dalit rally in Kochi which saw a massive turnout from SC communities.

... contd.