New Delhi, Jan 13 The violent protests in university campuses against the Citizenship Amendment Act and over fee hike in JNU has given a strong impression that perhaps such a scenario reflects the 'resentment' of the Indian middle class.
Over the last two decades, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had enhanced his 'acceptability' among middle class and in two subsequent polls, people voted to keep a 'strongman' in power who by default brought in element of religiosity and had the image of a 'performer'.
Political observers say prior to Mr Modi, two other Prime Ministers benefited from the popularity amongst middle class.
One of them was Late V P Singh, who could oust Rajiv Gandhi in 1989 and the other was Dr Manmohan Singh - whose acceptability was so much in 2009 that BJP projecting its mascot and 'Lohpurush' L K Advani as PM-designate was outright humbled in the general elections.
Several BJP leaders now on the condition of anonymity express apprehension that Indian middle class has the notorious popularity of rejecting their heroes with or without notice - but do it very quickly.
Looking back, analysts and insiders in the BJP say in the 2014 polls specially, the middle class voters showed preference for a 'super CEO' in Mr Modi who functioned more as a good manager and most often taking key decisions quickly putting bureaucratic formalities and delaying norms on the backburner.
BJP insiders say Mr Modi's quality for making quick decision had endeared him to the middle class as this section of people also wanted improvement in governance and to modernise the economy possibly with greater involvement of the private sector.
The middle class in India has often been very skeptical about the state of affairs as well and thus as violence 'visits' university campuses, none can be sure which way the ultimate sentiment of this section of Indians would go in the long run.
A Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) survey in 2008 had claimed that 51 per cent of the respondents from the elite “strongly agreed” and 29 per cent “agreed” with the proposition that - all major decisions about the country should be taken by experts rather than politicians.
But it also goes without stating that the political culture of the Indian middle class has often reflected clear partisan orientations as they solidly stood with Congress party in 1960s and 1970s in general but in some states they stuck with leaders such as Jyoti Basu (in West Bengal) for three decades.
The middle class has also shown endorsement of the 'Hindutva nationalist' sentiment as anti-Muslim and anti-Christian rhetoric and often 'alleged cases of mob lynching' did not take them away from the BJP.
In 2019, they stuck to Modi-Amit Shah duo though in states such as Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, the middle class had preferred Congress in assembly polls.
However, it is generally given to understand that the middle class go with the pro-Hindutva polity as long as the going is good economically and if things do not suit them any longer, they can take a different posture.
"V P Singh fell from the grace once he played up Mandal politics as it hit the upper castes middle class interest the most," says a BJP leader.
Closer scrutiny of Lok Sabha polls statistics also show a general trend against Muslims -- at least electorally.
Despite 14.6 per cent of population being Muslims, the House now has only 27 Muslim parliamentarians - that is about 4.5 per cent of the strength of the House.
The highest number of 49 Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha were elected in 1980.
In the 16th Lok Sabha, there were 23 Muslim MPs and most came from the Congress and the Trinamool Congress.
The highest number of Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha was in 1980, when 49 legislators from the community were elected.
BJP's alleged 'pro-elitist' tilt is also seen in the fact that out of 148 cow belt candidates from Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh - 33 Brahmins were elected and 80 were from upper castes.
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