BSP founder Kanshi Ram’s Dalit group Bamcef plans to contest 400 Lok Sabha seats

NEW DELHI: In an election that’s already thrown up surprise players, here’s another one. Bamcef, an organization set up by Late Kanshi Ram, the founder of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), plans to contest as many as 400 Lok Sabha seats with special focus on battle ground states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra and West Bengal. An announcement is expected early this week. The current head of the organization Waman Meshram told ET that Bamcef along with Bharat Mukti Morcha, another Dalit group, is in talks with prominent Muslim clerics to forge a Dalit-Muslim combination. Dalits and Muslims account for around 17% of the electorate each – the combined 34% share make for a potentially formidable bloc.

If successful in their campaign, such an outfit can prove a further challenge to Congress, which is already facing an erosion of Muslim support. The party has come in for sharp criticism by prominent Muslim clerics for its handling of terror cases and waqf land. Recent assembly polls also witnessed the community voting against the Congress.

Bamcef could also put a spanner in the works of Aam Admi Party (AAP) which has been actively wooing the Muslim and Dalit vote. The party’s spectacular debut in Delhi was largely credited to the two communities voting for it. Meshram says the ground work for the big political launch has been happening over the last one year through the organisation’s network of over 500 regional offices and 49 offshoot organizations. “More than 10,000 of our full time volunteers have been working on the ground in UP, Bihar and Mahrashtra. We will fight all the seats in these states,” says Meshram. At a huge conference organised last month in Lucknow by Bamcef, prominent clerics such as Mehmood Madni and other leaders of Muslim groups such as Jamiat-i-Islami among others discussed the benefits of such a dalit- muslim alliance. The group plans to field more than 80 Muslim candidates.’

The group had played a prominent role in agitating against “false arrests” of Muslim youth in the Malegaon blast case in Maharashtra. It now intends to lead a national campaign against the arrest of Himayat Baig, who has been convicted by a lower court for his alleged role in the German bakery case in Pune. Two other state police investigations have ruled that Baig is innocent. Bamcef was set up in 1971 by Kanshi Ram, DK Khaparde and Dina Bhana. The Bahujan Samaj Party was formed as the political arms of Bamcef which caused created tension within the organization. In 1986, Kanshi Ram split from Bamcef and announced that he will work only for the BSP. The other founders subsequently registered Bamcef in 1987. Meshram claims that several prominent corporate houses and a significant regional political party had offered to fund their political foray given the group’s reach and impact. “But our thrust is on people’s campaign. People will fund this campaign. At our Lucknow conference, we raised `50 lakhs in just one day through donations made on the spot,” says Meshram.