Lucknow: Even as the Mahila Sammelan in Varanasi saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi launching a caustic broadside at the opposition for stalling the 131st Constitutional Amendment Bill advancing women reservation, the BJP ensured that the event did not get directly affiliated to the party.This became evident as BJP avoided using party banners and flags at the all-woman-managed event, signaling a broader, non-partisan appeal.In fact, the advertisements of the event stood out for their unusual presentation. As an invitee, BJP president Nitin Nabin was identified not in his organizational role but solely as a Rajya Sabha MP. So was the case with Pankaj Chaudhary, who was mentioned only in his capacity as a Union minister, without reference to his position as the UP BJP chief.Varanasi’s event was akin to the ‘Jan Akrosh Mahila Padyatra’ that was led by chief minister Yogi Adityanath from his official 5 Kalidas Marg residence to the Vidhan Bhawan in Lucknow — a distance of 1.5Km— on April 21 in protest of the defeat of the women bill just four days earlier, on April 17. The rally, which was attended by scores of women, too, was organized sans any BJP flag. The foot march was held under tricolour.As a matter of fact, both the events saw a vast back-channel mobilization exercise by the BJP, pooling in party functionaries from the state to mandal level. For Varanasi’s Mahila Sammelan, BJP sources said, as many as 300 office-bearers from the state body to the regional units were strategically deployed to bring in as many women supporters as possible.Sources said the party pushed in its organizational machinery to rally women participants from as many as 17 districts under Kashi organizational region itself. This included women functionaries from Mahila Morcha, NGO and self-help group cells of the state BJP unit.Political analysts said the absence of BJP symbols and the prominence of the tricolour clearly suggested an attempt to universalise the message — positioning women’s representation as a national cause rather than a party agenda.Sources said the BJP think tank believed that a depoliticised visual environment could potentially make the outreach feel more inclusive and less like a campaign rally, even if it carried clear political undertones.A senior UP BJP leader said the absence of party flags and symbols was clearly aimed to help the BJP in bolstering participation of women across political leanings and affiliations.The move, at the same time, sought to translate into a higher polling turnout of women in support of the BJP in the high-stakes UP Assembly elections due early next year.The development added a strategic electoral layer as well.In states like UP, women voters have been projected as a decisive bloc over the past few decades, often showing distinct voting patterns. In the 2022 Assembly elections, women voters’ turnout exceeded that of men, though the overall turnout as well as female voting percentage was slightly lower than in the 2017 Assembly elections.The Election Commission data showed that as many as 62.4% of UP’s women electorate cast their vote in 2022, higher than men, who clocked a voting percentage of 59.56%. This was, however, lower than the 63.38% female turnout in the 2017 Assembly elections.
