Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly election, 2017

Electoral process changes

In January 2016, the Election Commission of India published updated electoral rolls in all 403 assembly segments. In July 2016, Election Commission decided to increase the number of polling booths in Uttar Pradesh for the 2017 Assembly elections. New polling centres will be planned in the constituencies having more than 1,500 registered voters as well as polling booths in six constituencies of Muzaffarnagar, Budhana, Purkazi, Khatoli, Charthawal and Midanpur to be raised from 1,769 to 1,819 booths. Voter assistance booths would be set up and photo slip of voters in a new design would be sent to them. First time, the Form-2B would contain the photograph of the candidates and their nationality.

Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines was used along with EVM in 30 assembly constituencies covering 14 districts including Varanasi, Ghaziabad and Bareilly constituency.

As per the special summary revision of electoral rolls, there are a total of 14.05 crore voters in Uttar Pradesh as of January 2015.

Caste and religion data

As per 2011 census, Dalits constitute 21.2% of Uttar Pradesh population. Mallah community is divided in 27 sub-castes. Other Backward Classes (OBCs) constitute 40% of U.P population. Yadavs are the biggest caste among OBCs. There are 200-odd non-Yadav OBCs in U.P. In Uttar Pradesh, Muslims are divided into 68 castes and sub-castes, 35 of them are OBCs. Forward castes constitute around 22% of Uttar Pradesh population, in which Brahmins are 10% and Rajputs are 8%. For accurate caste population data in India, Government of India has not publicly released Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 caste population data for every single non-SC/ST castes (General castes, OBC/EBCs) in India.

Election issues

In recent years people of Uttar Pradesh and rest of India had given more importance to economic and social development along with development of the people of their caste. Earlier the voters vote went to the party which gives benefits to their caste. Percentage of youths with literacy has increased cast their votes with hopes of jobs, security, good education and good life. Voting in favour of BJP in 2014 elections alternative to Congress due to the promises of development; and hopes of development have increased as people understand it importance. Other most and as in every election caste and religion will play the key reasons for voters. However, the Supreme Court ruled that prohibited use of religion, caste or language to solicit votes and forbade candidates from communal politics.

On 19 February 2017, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that if cemeteries are being built, crematoriums should be set up too. There should be no discrimination on Diwali and Ramzan.

Schedule

Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh were held between 11 February and 8 March 2017. The term of the outgoing government ended on 27 May 2017.

On 4 January 2017, The Election Commission of India announced the election schedule to the Legislative Assembly of Uttar Pradesh along with the other four state (Goa, Manipur, Punjab and Uttarakhand) which are due for an election. The entire election is scheduled into 7 phases.

Opinion polls

Various organisations/agencies have been conducting opinions polls to predict voter intentions in the upcoming legislative assembly elections.

Exit polls and forecast

Various organisations/agencies have been conducting Exit polls to predict voter intentions in the legislative assembly elections.

Result

The election results for 403 legislative assembly seats were declared on 11 March 2017.

This is incomplete, refer this link for complete details of Winner MLA Name, party & winning margin.

Reactions

After the BJP emerged as the majority party in the election, Prime Minister Narendra Modi thanked the public in a tweet saying, "Gratitude to the people of India for the continued faith, support and affection for the BJP. This is very humbling & overwhelming." The BJP's UP chief Keshav Prasad Maurya attributed the victory to Modi saying, "It is a Modi wave. The wave which started with 2014 Lok Sabha elections is continuing in 2017 and the momentum will go beyond the 2019 general elections." Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi sent a tweet to Modi congratulating him for his party's victory, to which Modi replied, "Thank you. Long live democracy!" Modi was congratulated on the victory by U.S. President Donald Trump during a telephone conversation on 27 March 2017.

The BBC wrote that the BJP "appears to have successfully forged a coalition of upper, middle-ranking and lower castes to be able to manipulate the social arithmetic of Indian elections". It also noted that the party had been able to avoid the image of "doling out reckless patronage to a caste or group", which the BBC considered responsible for the SP's defeat. Bhanu Joshi of Delhi-based think tank Centre for Policy Research said, "He [Modi] has managed to go beyond the caste arithmetic. On the ground, the BJP is not perceived as a casteist party."

Political scientist Milan Vaishnav felt that the election "represents a referendum on demonetisation". Vaishnav said, "Whether voters were bothered by the implementation of the policy or not, they clearly have decided that the PM is a man of action."

BSP Leader and former Chief Minister Mayawati claimed that the BJP tampered with the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) thereby rigging the election outcome. However, this charge was rejected by the Election Commission as well as other parties as lacking any substance.