Keeping up with UP: Yogi defines his political territory, snubs detractors

Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath sent two clear messages to the party high command during recent celebrations to mark eight years in office. The assertive messaging came in the backdrop of intensified speculation about his promotional shift to the Centre as well as the expected appointment of a new Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national president.

In what appears to be a political snub to his detractors, who have so far unsuccessfully attempted to dislodge him from the CM’s chair, Yogi made it clear in recent interviews that he would prefer to return to his Gorakhnath Math in Gorakhpur rather than shift to New Delhi as a central minister.

Yogi had told HT in an interview in 2022 that “I was a Yogi, and will remain a Yogi always. I will not take a minute to return to the Math once I have completed my job. However, the state, country and the world have seen how a Yogi, who is into pure spirituality, can also be a performer…”

Since then, not only has his stature grown within the party, his area of political influence has also expanded outwards from Gorakhpur. The party high command would perhaps think twice before upsetting the applecart. Also, it will be equally tough for Yogi to relinquish the chair.

Many in the party recall the experience of the 2002 state assembly elections when the BJP nominee in Gorakhpur was defeated by his candidate. He had also refused to attend party stalwart Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s rally in his home district, forcing senior leaders to rush to the Math to cajole him.

However, his detractors, who have demanded his replacement by an OBC leader to counter Samajwadi Party’s PDA formula that harmed them in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, have once again raised their voice but it seems too weak to make a mark. Though Yogi’s style of functioning might have made a few in the party unhappy, there has been no major revolt against him for the party high command to sit up and take notice.

Yogi has survived clandestine moves to dislodge him — the strongest was made soon after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections after the party’s unexpectedly bad performance, which was nearly enough to impact Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s third stint in office. Many in the party concede that his shift from UP then would not have met any major opposition from him or any quarter. Now, Yogi is far more assertive and aggressive.

Yogi’s second message is more consequential as he toes a somewhat harder Hindutva and religious line.

Contrary to the public posturing of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) leadership disapproving the “politics of divisiveness and majoritarian supremacy”, Yogi is pushing the Mathura and Sambhal temple agendas, which the Sangh Parivar had judiciously side-stepped, at least for the time being.

RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat has emphasised on the need to focus on harmony while asking people to “move beyond the burden of historical grievances” and “avoid fostering enmity by raking up new contentious issues over temples and mosques.” Yogi, however, in a recent interview to ANI demanded to know why should they not raise the issue of Mathura, the birthplace of Krishna, or the Sambhal dispute?

Significantly, the same Yogi who nonchalantly spoke this week about following court orders or else a lot could have happened in Mathura, used to avoid queries on the Krishna Janmabhoomi till sometime back though he frequently visited Mathura to draw the blueprint on the lines of Kashi. Even in the context of Sambhal, he not only questioned the construction of mosques at Hindu temple sites, but also spoke about 64 pilgrimage sites, of which they have found 54.

Various independent groups are engaged in locating abandoned temples in the state as well as the ones on which mosques were raised.

Ironically, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi is offering an olive branch to the Muslims of the country by gifting “Saugat-e-Modi” for Eid for the first time, the UP CM has laid down stricter norms for celebration of Eid and offering of namaaz in the state. So, while, state BJP leaders would move around the state presending Saugat-e-Modi, Yogi’s administration will be ensuring the strict implementation of CM’s diktats.

There are two possibilities: Either he has the tacit support of the Sangh Parivar, as it suits their dream of a Hindu Rashtra or Yogi has now decided to tread his own path. And the BJP knows they can’t control him as he is the leader of a revered math who has cultivated an electoral base for himself in a section of the Hindu society.

Yogi was a surprise chief minister, selected from a list of 40 contenders in 2017. Now he is a strong PM contender, according to his supporters.

It’s a political gamble for the RSS as Modi had moved to the Centre with the Gujarat model and now Yogi has constructed a UP model. If it is a part of their hidden design, then Sangh Parivar may be wish to replicate it at the national level.