The auxiliary support is a mix of caste, class and gender. It comes from the poorest cutting across caste and from caste groups closest to dalits — artisans, service and non-dominant peasant OBCs — more women than men. This support has been with the BSP for some time and can become an enduring asset, provided the BSP uses its state power to cultivate its support.

The floating vote is the smallest and most transient component of the BSP’s support, but it gets the highest media attention. This reflects the dividends of some of the high-profile caste alliances with brahmins and Muslims etc. But this vote is most sensitive to issues, perceptions of governance and to the social profile of candidates.

How we understand the BSP’s social coalition makes a difference to how we understand the future of UP’s politics. With this election the BSP has reached a saturation point of its core vote — its vote share among dalits is one of the highest recorded for any one large social group in any state of India since Independence. If it is a two-caste coalition, the challenge is to strengthen the new vote bank of the ‘upper caste samaj’. If it is a coalition of the oppressed, the challenge for the BSP is to come up with a different kind of policy initiatives addressed to the multiple disadvantages that mark contemporary UP.