In preparation for the Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is focusing on reaching out to the OBC community in Uttar Pradesh and will be conducting “community meetings” from next month. The party has formed a number of core committees in every district for the same. Additionally, the BJP is training over 500 “OBC warriors” for each assembly constituency to participate in the upcoming elections.
This initiative was first proposed by the BJP’s OBC Morcha wing. On Monday, the saffron party’s OBC Morcha held a meeting to plan the entire event. The party’s OBC wing is reportedly placing its focus on OBC youth and is training 500 workers from the community to be deployed at all 403 assembly constituencies in Uttar Pradesh. The BJP’s focus on the OBC community comes as a countermeasure to the opposition’s push for a caste-based census. The party does not want to lag behind in any way in bringing the OBC community into its fold before the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The meetings will be first held at the district level and then at the state level. The OBC Morcha is actively training active workers and leaders from the community, who will also be responsible for managing the campaign until the Lok Sabha elections. These workers will be trained through workshops in several districts to provide citizens with information about the central and UP governments’ initiatives for the backward classes.
The first of these workshops was held at the BJP state headquarters on Monday. Narendra Kashyap, the state president of the OBC Morcha, said that the Centre had granted constitutional status to the OBC Commission.
“Reservations for the backward classes have also been provided in the NEET exam and admissions to central universities and military schools. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has inducted 27 MPs from backward classes into his cabinet. No government has done all this work before.”
These training workshops clearly indicate that the BJP is making concerted efforts to retain its standing in Uttar Pradesh, as well as reaching out to members of the OBC community.