By concentrating on Yadavs and Muslims, Mulayam left political space for the BJP to mobilise non-Yadav OBCs and other Hindu communities, reshaping Uttar Pradesh’s electoral landscape ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections.
Mulayam Singh Yadav understood the power of caste mobilisation, but his politics had a fundamental limitation: he concentrated on Muslims and Yadavs. In doing so, he left a wider constituency of non-Yadav Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and other Hindu communities open to mobilisation by the BJP, changing the political grammar of Uttar Pradesh.
This is the political landscape as it stands in 2026.
In the 403-member Uttar Pradesh Assembly, the Samajwadi Party (SP) currently has 101 MLAs and the Congress two. The SP had won 37 seats in 2017 before increasing its tally by 64 to 101 in the 2022 Assembly elections. The BJP, which won 302 seats in 2017, saw its tally fall to 255 in 2022.
Today, there is much discussion about Gen Z and the emergence of a “neo-aspirational India”, a category that goes beyond the traditional neo-middle class.
There was a time, however, when political leaders preferred populism as a means of connecting with voters. Mulayam Singh Yadav, the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister, was among them.
The caste arithmetic behind the BJP’s rise
The social composition of Uttar Pradesh has long made caste alliances central to electoral calculations. Estimates commonly used in political analyses around the 2017 elections placed the general-category population at approximately 23.6 per cent, including Brahmins, Rajputs or Thakurs, Baniyas, and Kayasthas.
The OBCs were estimated to account for around 45 per cent of the population. Within this broad category, political estimates distinguished between dominant or core OBC communities, including Yadavs, Lodhs, Kurmis and Jats, and Most Backward Classes (MBCs), including Rajbhars, Nishads, Kumhars and Kahars.
The estimates cited in this political analysis put dominant or core OBC groups at approximately 18 per cent and MBCs at around 16.7 per cent.
These figures should be treated as estimates rather than official, comprehensive caste-enumeration results.
The BJP’s political achievement was to reach beyond its traditional upper-caste support base and consolidate sections of these non-Yadav OBC communities alongside other Hindu voters. This widened its social coalition and weakened the assumption that OBC politics in Uttar Pradesh would remain centred on the Samajwadi Party.
Another consequential development was Mulayam’s gradual accommodation of his son Akhilesh Yadav within the party organisation. In 2012, Akhilesh became chief minister, marking a generational transition in the SP.
“I love the Mahabharat analogy. In fact, when Mulayam had chosen to make his son the CM in 2012, we immediately saw in the eye of our mind the image of Dhritarashtra,” says Sanjeev Nachiketa, a former Uttar Pradesh politician now settled in Gujarat.
The analogy captures one criticism of Mulayam’s leadership: that personal and family considerations increasingly influenced the party’s organisation and succession.
In comparing Mulayam with Bihar leader Lalu Prasad Yadav, some observers considered the former more willing to take political risks and more pragmatic in his calculations.
By the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the SP leadership had discovered that relying on the fear of a resurgent Hindu political mobilisation was not enough to sustain its electoral position.
In 2017, the BJP made Hindutva a central plank of its Uttar Pradesh campaign, alongside its broader political messaging. The SP was pushed back, the BSP lost ground, and Yogi Adityanath became chief minister.
Ayodhya, political alliances and the limits of personal manoeuvring
Mulayam’s first tenure as Uttar Pradesh chief minister, from 1989 to 1991, was brief but consequential. His government depended on outside support from the Congress, a relationship that eventually broke down.
His handling of the Ayodhya movement proved especially contentious. In October 1990, security forces fired on kar sevaks near the disputed structure. The action became a defining episode in his political career and contributed to his polarising image.
Many Hindu critics accused him of being excessively accommodating towards Muslims and heavy-handed towards Hindu protesters. At the same time, his critics among minorities questioned his inability to prevent subsequent violence and protect the disputed site.
His handling of Ayodhya thus became a lasting source of political contention.
Mulayam, however, was pursuing a political strategy. In the post-liberalisation period, aspirational groups in India’s most populous state felt left out of the emerging economic opportunities.
The Lohiaite emphasis on mother tongues appealed to a section of the electorate and helped the Samajwadi Party consolidate support.
Mulayam was an astute politician with a keen ear to the ground. Yet his social coalition remained narrower than the wider OBC mobilisation he professed to champion.
Yadavs formed the SP’s core social base, while Muslims constituted another important constituency. Other OBC communities and Dalits, however, were not integrated into the same political arrangement to a comparable degree.
Dalits gravitated towards the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) under Mayawati for a period. Subsequently, the BJP successfully mobilised a broader Hindu constituency, including non-Yadav OBCs, particularly in the 2014 Lok Sabha and 2017 Assembly elections.
That constituency would prove decisive in reshaping Uttar Pradesh politics.
Mulayam also developed a reputation for unpredictable political manoeuvering.
He played a significant role in the political developments surrounding Sonia Gandhi’s unsuccessful 1999 bid to become prime minister. His association with Amar Singh, who became an influential figure in the SP, changed the party’s political style and power equations.
Yet the socialist tradition around Mulayam was never limited to one individual. Leaders such as Mohan Singh, Janeshwar Mishra and Rewati Raman Singh were also important to the party’s political identity. Amar Singh’s arrival added a different dimension to Mulayam’s political and personal world.
In 1993, Mulayam joined hands with Kanshi Ram and the BSP to form a government, halting the BJP’s advance after the Babri Masjid demolition.
The alliance demonstrated the potential of a combined OBC-Dalit political front. However, it collapsed dramatically in 1995, exposing the fragility of alliances built around competing leadership ambitions and social constituencies.
The 2024 Lok Sabha elections offered the SP a significant boost. It won 37 of Uttar Pradesh’s 80 seats, while the Congress secured six. The BJP won 33 seats and the National Democratic Alliance 36 in the state.
These results demonstrated that the SP could expand its appeal through an alliance with the Congress. But sustaining that coalition into a state election will require more than a favourable seat-sharing arrangement. It will require the party to maintain its core support while reaching communities that have moved towards the BJP.
The legacy of Mulayam’s politics
Mulayam was a former wrestler, and his political style often resembled the sport: direct, combative and focused on reading the opponent. He believed in OBC mobilisation but built his strongest electoral base around Yadavs, while relying heavily on Muslim support.
His limitation was not that caste mobilisation failed as a political strategy. It was that his version of it did not adequately accommodate the full range of communities that could have formed a broader social coalition.
The BJP recognised that opening and turned non-Yadav OBCs and other Hindu communities into a significant part of its electoral base. That shift changed the political grammar of Uttar Pradesh, making it harder for the SP to claim that OBC politics naturally translated into support for Yadav-led leadership.Buy Maps
Mulayam’s legacy also includes a family-centred party structure and allegations of cronyism. His language policy reflected another aspect of his populist approach: he made the use of Hindi mandatory in offices, courts and local establishments. It took years for the SP to move away from its anti-English position, a shift that coincided with the rise of his foreign-educated son, Akhilesh, within the party.
The central lesson of Mulayam Singh Yadav’s political career is that a durable social coalition requires more than loyalty from a core constituency. It must also accommodate groups that do not automatically identify with the party’s traditional base.
In Uttar Pradesh, the BJP understood that opportunity and exploited it. The challenge for Akhilesh Yadav ahead of 2027 is to demonstrate that the Samajwadi Party can build a coalition broad enough to compete—not simply revive the politics of his father, but overcome its limitations.
ends
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