UP: Changing aspirations, at last

Lucknow: A new empire is being established in Lucknow. It is the Empire of the Dalit, ascendant at last; and it is the empire of aspirations, in which Uttar Pradesh (UP) has long lagged India.

It is evident from the new Dhaulpur stone-coloured monuments and architecture of the public spaces, which are the definition of Lucknow in 2012. It is also clear from the mood of people in UP, who are now looking less at caste and more East and South at Bihar for a model of transformation.

First the monuments. Far from the ridicule heaped on it by opponents of UP Chief Minister Mayawati, the magnificence of the Bhimrao Ambedkar Gomti Park in Lucknow has given UP pride. Everywhere, even in Kallu ka Purva in Rae Barelli district, which is the Gandhi family’s heartland, people are proud of the park. Young people say, “Now Lucknow is better than America, do you know that?”

Not quite, but certainly the public space created in Lucknow has no comparison anywhere in India, and is close only to the grand public spaces built in China in this century and Europe in the last. The builder was Lucknow’s Public Works Department, proving that state agencies can do a lot and do their best. The chief sculptor was Ram Sutar, India’s premier sculptor. Mayawati chose the very best for her people.

But what of her political legacy? UP’s growth is now over 6%, same as India’s nationally – another first in decades. It contributes to more than 8% of the country’s GDP, behind only Maharashtra. There is improvement to be seen – there are more schools and better roads than I saw in UP five years ago when touring the state before the previous state elections. And there are awakened aspirations. The roads and the elementary and middle schools are no longer enough improvement for the UP-wallah. Now people want schools up to the 12^th standard in their village and hospitals, and they want access to professional degrees close by – medical colleges, engineering colleges, teaching degree colleges. They want vocational training, and of course they all now want jobs – that word not has still not been used to win elections in India so far. Jobs. Young men want work and young women want work.

In Lalganj, Priti Shukla, 20, is celebrating her birthday with two of her friends at a small dhaba that sells diet coke, cream cakes and Chinese noodles. Lalganj is a spec – and it reflects the larger change in UP. Priti and her friends are both Brahmin, and study in a private college close by but for which they pay a subsidised fee. They will vote for Pramod Tiwari, the Brahmin, a Congress candidate in the area who they say has done a lot for them. But they want more. They’re all studying home science, sociology and Hindi, but can’t hope for jobs close by. They will have to go to Allahabad, a big city. And they will go, and they will work.

This is the new UP that is emerging, the UP yearning beyond caste equality to development and jobs. The question is, who is representing this new environment? Is it Mayawati? Rahul Gandhi? Sonia Gandhi? Akhilesh Yadav (son of Mulayam Singh Yadav)? The BJP? Dr. Ayub of the new Peace Party, allegedly funded by the once-powerful Amar Singh, and formed for Muslims and for that old, old slogan “the poorest of the poor?”

While the new truth of UP is comforting, the old truth of UP is equally disturbing: in some villages in Rampur district like Raipur, nearly every family has a member working away in Bombay or Delhi. This despite there being a Congress party-supported ITI nearby and a railway coach factory.

A group of young men have gathered to watch Priyanka Gandhi campaign in their town. The constituency is Sonia Gandhi’s at the centre – and the municipal or ‘nagar-palika’ is also run by Congress. One of them says the job situation is so poor that a young man of 18 can be hired as a shop boy for Rs. 1,200 or 1,500 a month, where he will work from 7 am to 11 pm “and also endure the abuses of the boss. How can anyone survive?” They are skeptical about the Congress’ chances in the area. It’s not surprising – the paving of the main drag is terrible, and the sanitation and cleanliness is non-existent.

Congress isn’t only to blame. Mayawati’s BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party) and Yadav’s SP (Samajwadi Party) are also at fault. None have really taken the trouble to govern. The road from Lucknow to Kanpur is awful – part of the old UP. Akhilesh Yadav, a charming young man with an easy confidence, who looks remarkably like his father and has probably inherited his flinty parochialism, says his socialist Samajwadi Party has built the roads and bridges and schools that Mayawati is taking credit for. He says if the SP comes to power, he will build a medical college in the middle of the Bhimrao Ambedkar Gomti Park in Lucknow, putting it to better use than the empire-building ego trip of a Dalit leader.

Akhilesh Yadav addressing a rally

That would be a shame. For the first time in decades in India, someone is thinking positively about public spaces, where people in this crowded land can walk and enjoy the breezes and sights of beauty around them. Better for Priyanka Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav to promise more public spaces and institutions, and more jobs and opportunity for UP’s youth.

Next: Kanpur, once India’s manufacturing hub. Where will this election place it now?

Manjeet Kripalani is Executive Director of Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.

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