Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati ended speculation on the future of her party on Sunday, officially naming nephew Akash Anand as her political successor. Sources told News18 that the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister announced Anand as her successor at the BSP’s national-level meeting held in Lucknow. the decision was taken
Though Mayawati will continue to monitor the party’s affairs in UP and Uttarakhand as before, the announcement created ripples in the state’s political circles in which the BSP holds a significance position despite its poor run at the polls.
Senior BSP leaders say Mayawati’s statement was expected given 28-year-old Akash Anand’s steady rise in the party. Akash is the son of Mayawati’s brother Anand Kumar. “Akash was recently given the crucial post of party coordinator. He used to hold meetings with the party leaders of other states. He used to hold a different stature in the party,” a senior BSP leader told News18 on condition of anonymity.
Who is Akash Anand
According to BSP insiders, Mayawati began grooming her nephew Akash for a leadership role ahead of the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. Akash Anand and his father Anand Kumar were formally introduced to the party workers in September 2017.
Akash’s political journey began thereafter and he became more politically active in the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. In 2019, a day after the Election Commission banned Mayawati from campaigning for 48 hours, Akash took to the stage and addressed his first rally, urging people to vote for the SP-BSP-RLD alliance. Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and then RLD president Ajit Singh also joined him on stage.
A few weeks after the alliance’s defeat, Mayawati appointed him the party’s national coordinator and tasked him with reaching out to the youth, especially those from the Dalit community, and bringing them into the BSP fold.
Akash’s Rise in the BSP
Akash Anand’s growing stature in the party became more evident during the recently held Assembly elections when he was made in-charge of the poll-bound states, with particular emphasis on Rajasthan. “Mayawati is not known for holding street shows or taking out yatras. But, in a clean break from BSP’s past, Akash took out a 14-day yatra – the ‘Sarvajan Hitay, Sarvajan Sukhay Sankalp Yatra’ — in Rajasthan to drum up support for the BSP,” the senior leader quoted earlier pointed out.
Akash addressed the yatra at different points as it travelled across 100 Assembly constituencies, covering 3,000 km. The constituencies also included the six seats the party won in 2018 — all of its MLAs later joined the Congress — and nine seats where its candidates finished as runners-up. The yatra began from Dholpur and concluded in Jaipur on August 29, covering 33 districts.
The Challenges Ahead
Akash Anand’s appointment as the BSP supremo’s successor comes with the major responsibility of rebuilding the party’s base in UP, where Dalits account for around 20% of the population. In the BSP’s glory days, Dalits were its traditional voters. However, over the years, the party’s performance has slipped drastically.
In 2007, the party won 206 seats in the 403-member Assembly and formed the state government with Mayawati as the chief minister. In 2012, it was ousted from power by the Samajwadi Party, winning just 80 seats.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the BSP failed to win a single seat in the Lower House of Parliament. In the 2017 Assembly elections, its tally plummeted further to 19 seats, with 22.2% vote share.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BSP partnered with the SP to form an anti-BJP ‘Mahagathbandhan’ (grand alliance) along with Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD). The alliance, however, failed to leave a mark and secured just 15 seats, while the BJP won 62 of the 80 seats. In the alliance, BSP’s vote share was 19.43%, whereas SP and RLD vote share was 18.11% and 1.69%, respectively.
In the 2022 Assembly elections, the party won just one seat and its vote share dropped to 12.88%.
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