Chavanni taunt opens caste fault lines in western UP as SP, RLD trade barbs

A political storm is brewing in western Uttar Pradesh over a metaphor involving the now-defunct 25-paise coin, the chavanni. The dispute has pitted Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav against Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) president Jayant Chaudhary, exposing deep caste and community fault lines just ahead of the state election.

The conflict began when Mr. Yadav, at a recent Lucknow event, took a veiled swipe at his former ally. "We turned a chavanni into a rupee, and yet they left us," he said. This was a pointed reference to Mr. Chaudhary's own 2022 declaration, when he resisted the BJP's initial overtures by stating, "I am not a chavanni that will flip."

Mr. Chaudhary, however, did eventually join the BJP-led NDA before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. He defended the move, citing the conferment of the Bharat Ratna on his grandfather, former Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh. He later explained his political switch with a cryptic line, saying he did not betray anyone but executed a strategic move to slam his political rivals.

The Jat community has interpreted this shift in two ways. Some, who hold a grudge against Mulayam Singh Yadav for his past actions, see Mr. Chaudhary's move as a perfect political calculation. Others, particularly farmers who questioned the silence of the BJP's Jat face during the farm agitation, view it as a strategic attempt to reclaim Jat politics while staying within the NDA.

Now, two years later, the ground has shifted. The SP's narrative suggests Mr. Chaudhary owes his Rajya Sabha seat to the party and should have resigned upon joining the NDA. The breakdown is also attributed to seat-sharing, with the SP reportedly offering more seats than the BJP did in the last Lok Sabha polls. The SP is now keen to win over RLD's Muslim MLAs and the Gurjar community in the Jat belt.

Mr. Chaudhary has long championed a bhaichara (brotherhood) plank, but the current friction threatens to undermine it. This is advantageous for the BJP, which could benefit from polarisation in the region. While some in the state's ruling party feel the RLD tie-up didn't yield electoral dividends, others believe it secured peace at the border by pacifying Jat farmers.

The RLD has since included farmer leader Yudhvir Singh in its Parliamentary Board, signalling its intent to strengthen its agrarian base. The party believes it averted a crisis from the BJP's internal strife and is now seeking a larger share of power.

The spat has forced Mr. Chaudhary to invoke his Jat identity, a departure from his earlier public stance. After SP state president Shyamlal Pal mocked the RLD leadership, Mr. Chaudhary posted a thinly veiled message on X, suggesting it would have been better had people targeted him rather than the community. He further warned at a rally, "G for Ganna and J, you know," implying the RLD would trap the SP between sugarcane and Jats. The SP's Gurjar leadership responded in kind, saying, "If J stands for Jat, G has to be Gurjar."

Observers note that Mr. Chaudhary is under pressure from a vote bank that sees its future with the BJP. However, his silence on issues like paper leaks and his past actions during farmer protests are being questioned. The recent murder of a Haryanvi singer in Shamli is seen as another test for him to adopt a more aggressive posture.

The central question remains whether Mr. Chaudhary can shed the chavanni tag by forcing the BJP to cede seats worth a "rupee" in the upcoming polls.