After Barabanki the rath enters Faizabad constituency which includes Ayodhya. The seat is currently held by the BJP's Vinay Katiyar. But the hero of the Ram temple movement has actually abandoned this prestigious seat this time around as the bsp's Mitrasen Yadav, once a CPI heavyweight who had won the seat many times before the BJP's post-mandir ascendancy, is once again tipped to win. So when Kalyan Singh, who accompanied Advani through Uttar Pradesh, tries to evoke enthusiasm for the construction of a Ram mandir, he only ends up sounding plain hackneyed and unconvincing. The crowd listens calmly but the days of hysterical mobs shrieking Jai Shri Ram are clearly over.
In the absence of help from Ram, the BJP has been claiming that there is an Atal wave in the making. It soon becomes clear that this is an exaggeration. There is no wave in favour of any party in Uttar Pradesh. The election here is all about management at the constituency level. And the BJP has the organisational wherewithal to make a fight of it. By and large, it's a three-cornered contest in Uttar Pradesh between the SP, BSP and the BJP. The Congress is a factor in only about a dozen of the state's 80 seats. In the 1999 election, the Congress had won 10 seats. And because of the growing undercurrent of support for the party it should be able to retain that figure.
It's more difficult to predict whether the BJP will retain or improve on its current haul of 29 seats. For, in a tight contest, a lot will depend on whether the state's Muslims still go out in large numbers to tactically vote against the party. There is a growing apathy and disillusionment among the Muslims who constitute nearly 19 per cent of the population. This is partly due to the perception that one-time Muslim icon Mulayam Singh Yadav is currently the chief minister because of a "deal" with the BJP. Shabihul Hassan, a Lucknow lawyer, says: "There is suspicion that both the BSP and SP will support an NDA government after the polls in order to get or retain power in UP."
That is why there is a longing in the Muslim community to vote for the Congress. But in the absence of the Congress as a serious contender, they will eventually divide their votes between the SP and the BSP depending on the constituency and the candidate. Apart from the Muslims, a strong section of the state's Brahmins and Kayasthas also express a longing for the good old days of Congress raj.
Amethi and Rae Bareli are repeatedly described as Nehru-Gandhi family "pocketboroughs" by the media. Though both the Lok Sabha seats are held by the Congress, the party's precarious situation in UP can be driven home by two simple facts: not a single assembly segment of Rae Bareli was won by the Congress in the 2002 state election; in Amethi the party won only one assembly segment.
The images of delirious crowds welcoming Rahul and Priyanka do not, therefore, tell the whole story. Besides whipping up a wave, the Congress will need to revive its party structure to even make it a contest against entrenched parties like the BJP, SP and BSP in the state. But now, with Rahul in the electoral fray, the Congress can at least begin to hope for a brighter future.
