Jaffrelot, Christophe. "The Rise of the Other Backward Classes in the Hindi Belt". The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol.59, No.1 (2000): 86-108.

Jaffrelot, Christophe. "The Rise of the Other Backward Classes in the Hindi Belt". The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol.59, No.1 (2000): 86-108.

• The 'other backward classes' [OBC] are the group of Shundras who are above the level of untouchables, but not a member of the smallholding Shundra group. They represent approximately half of the Indian population, and are mainly farmers and artisans (86). 
• The domination of upper castes in politics and the economy has always been greater in the Hindi Belt than elsewhere, partially because upper castes constitute a much larger proportion of that population in the north than in the south, and partially because traditional systems of land tenure in these areas were retained during the Raj to the advantage of upper caste landowners (86).
• Upper caste elites, especially in the north, constituted the early base of Congress's political power, as Congress gained the loyalty of upper caste landlords who could provide the votes of tenants via a patronage system and some select Dalit leaders. This patronage political system endured for decades, continuing to exclude the OBCs from politics in the Hindi Belt (86).
• Historically, there have been two methods of trying to disrupt the power of the urban upper castes in northern India: the mobilization of landholding kisan [peasants] based on common rural identity and agricultural interests, like Chhotu Ram in Punjab during the 1920s or Swami Sahajanand in Bihar during the 1930s; the mobilization of lower castes around caste inequalities by socialist leaders, like Rammanohar Lohia, asking for state protection (87, 106).
• These two political trends against the upper caste political establishment bore fruit during the 1960s, when first middle caste peasants and then OBCs managed to win political representation in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar under socialist parties and Janata Dal Party, led by Charan Singh (87).
• In the 1980s and 1990s, the politics of the kisan and the OBCs began to diverge over issues regarding the implementation of the reservation policy recommended by the Mandal Commission. The kisan group has since divided along caste lines (87).
• Jawaharlal Nehru made some rhetorical gestures towards promoting the wellbeing of the OBCs, but never made concrete moves as Congress depended on the power of local notables for its political success (87). Under the Nehru government, an Other Backward Classes Commission was created on 29 January 1953 under Kaka Kalelkar, it recommended that affirmative action programs be developed for the group. Home Minister Govind Ballabh Pant convinced the Nehru government to reject these findings, arguing that they would only strengthen caste distinctions which should disappear as India became socialist (88).
• Communist parties in India were opposed to politicization of caste, instead choosing to submerge caste oppression wholly within class conflict. This trend was rejected by Rammanohar Lohia, who explicitly differentiated the caste conflict and the class conflict. Mr. Lohia advocated affirmative action as a solution, warning that otherwise even a socialist India would still experience caste inequalities (88-89).
• Under Mr. Lohia's leadership, the Socialist Party advocated the reservation of 60% of administrative positions for the OBCs, Dalits, and adivasi in its 1959 conference. This program led the party to limited electoral success in Bihar during the 1960s and 1970s, during which almost all leaders were lower caste (89-90).
• A movement among the middle class peasant proprietaries emerged during the 1960s during a period of economic growth, led by Charan Singh. Land reform, although largely incomplete, had allowed for peasants to become landowners, and the Green Revolution had greatly increased the efficiency of agriculture, both enriching and empowering peasants (91).
• Mr. Singh was first elected in 1937 on claims to represent the interests of rural India in a political environment dominated by urban professionals, moneylenders, and absentee landlords. He proposed establishing a 50% quota on administration positions for the sons of farmers (91).
• Although his position and election were endorsed by the All-India Jat Mahasabha, Mr. Singh tried to distance himself from caste groups like the Jat Mahasabha, especially since the Jat constituted such a small minority in Uttar Pradesh, in favor of developing an inter-caste alliance of kisan (91).
• The singular and unitary rural identity which Mr. Singh tried to create was political successful, but ignored the social and economic divisions within the countryside, particularly between landowners and sharecroppers. By ignoring these divisions, Mr. Singh ended up supporting the continuation of these rural inequalities (92-93).
• After independence, Mr. Singh was elected the Revenue Minister in Uttar Pradesh, and used the position to abolish the zamindari system, giving more independence to landowning farmers. Although many OBCs supported Mr. Singh, his policies actually benefited only the class of wealthier peasants who already owned their own land and were able to sell crops commercially, a group that was disproportionately Jat (91).
• Mr. Singh opposed other measures to redistribute land that would have more greatly benefited the, largely landless, OBCs. In 1959, Mr. Singh strongly opposed a plan by the Nehru government to create agricultural collectives, which he argued would reduce agricultural productivity and harm the interests of smallholders. He seemed wholly unconcerned with the impoverished conditions of landless tenant farmers and sharecroppers or their interests (92).
• The Janata Party, formed in 1975, combined elements of both kisan politics and the affirmative action movement, represented by its two leaders: Madhu Limaye, who stressed issues of caste discrimination and the necessity of reservations; and Charan Singh, who organized the movement in opposition to what he considered the domination of the urban elite through the Indian National Congress (93-94).
• Charan Singh was alienated during the early part of the Janata Party's time in government in Uttar Pradesh, seen as too uppity by former-Prime Minister Morarji Desai. He still possessed enough clout among the wealthy peasants to force his way back into government through mass protests in 1978, and create the 'kulak budget', which reduced taxes on farmers, in 1979 (94).
• The national Janata government was a heterogeneous coalition of many forces, including upper caste interests, but there were enough lower caste interests in the party to force Prime Minister Desai to create a second Other Backward Classes Commission, chaired by Bindheshwari Prasad Mandal. The findings of the Mandal Commission were tabled under subsequent Congress governments, scared of angering their upper caste constituencies, only being released by the 1989 Janata Dal government (94).
• The Janata Dal party was founded on 11 October 1988 by former supporters and family members of Charan Singh and Rammanohar Lohia, including many socialist elements in the defunct Janata Party. The party was still split along the lines of these two traditions, with socialists advocating a 60% policy of reservations, and Devi Lal, a major Jat leader from Haryana, objecting; they eventually compromised by implementing the recommendations of the Mandal Commission (94-95).
• Devi Lal, as Chief Minister of Haryana, was able to use the power of Janata Dal to pursue his brand of kisan politics, but his political views were not strongly represented in the Janata Dal national government. Under Prime Minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh, the Janata Dal government pursued affirmative action policies for the OBCs, largely using Mr. Lal and others as tokens to attract the support of peasant smallholders (95-96).
• Originally, Prime Minister Singh appointed Mr. Lal to chair the committee responsible for implementing the recommendations of the Mandal Commission, but was frustrated by Mr. Lal's lack of interest and attempts to get the Jat included on the list of OBCs. This eventually resulted in Mr. Lal's replacement with Ram Vilas Paswan as chair, and Mr. Lal's resignation from the government over the tensions between kisan politics and OBC interests (96-97).
• The implementation of the recommendations of the Mandal Commission politicized and cemented the OBC identity among the lower castes, an identity further reinforced by upper caste, sometimes violent, resistance to reservation policies. Upper caste opposition to the Mandal Commission brought the OBCs and Dalits closer politically, turning OBCs into an extremely powerful political bloc (97-98).
• This sudden increase in caste consciousness caused OBCs to revolt against the domination of politics by the upper castes, resulting in a rapid increase in the number of OBC MPs and other politicians during the 1980s, accelerating during the 1990s when major political parties started nominated OBC candidates (98).
• Tensions over the expansion of the reservation system started to cool following the liberalization reforms, as many more positions in the private sector -- which was not subject to the reservation system -- began to become available (101).
• Janata Dal supported even more solidly pro-OBC policies when elected to state governments in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. In these states, Janata Dal implemented the 27% reservation quota at the state level and, in Bihar, implemented a 50% reservation for university positions and total reservations for panchayat positions in OBC-majority areas (101-102).
• These policies disproportionately benefited the Yadav, as this group was able to dominate the new reserved positions in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar on account of their relatively advantaged education and economic position, as well as demographic advantage in these states (102-103).
• The rise of OBCs in Indian politics did not occur evenly among groups, with the Yadav and Kurmi benefitting disproportionately from the reservation of seats for OBCs. Collectively, these castes represent a third of all OBC MPs in northern India. Other castes did manage to gain repesentation during the 1980s and 1990s, but the dominance of the Yadav and Kurmi also increased during this period (100).
• The Yadav and Kurmi were at the forefront of movements advocating for the promotion of OBC interests; the leader of the All-India Backward Caste Federation in the 1960s and 1970s was a Yadav, as were Mr. Mandal, and both the parliamentary leader and President of Janata Dal (100).
• The Yadav were also instrumental in leading counter-protests during the intense tensions against the implementation of the recommendations of the Mandal Commission in the 1990s. In doing so and promoting unity among OBCs, they also protected their caste interests by allowing wealthy OBCs -- who were overwhelmingly Yadav -- to retain the benefits of the reservation system (100-101).
• The Yadav domination of OBC politics ended up resulting in splits within the OBC political movement by the mid-1990s, as lower castes of OBCs started to support alternatives to the Yadav-dominated Samajwadi Party, including the BJP, Bahujan Samaj Party, and Samata Dal party (103-104).
• The actual level of political inclusion of the OBCs has varied widely between states. It has been most pronounced in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh, while the caste demographics of politicians in Rajasthan has only experienced marginal change (98).
• The politicization of caste divides during the 1990s prompted many upper castes and non-OBC lower castes, like the Jat, to migrate to the BJP because it expressed initial opposition to the reservation system and Hindutva had traditionally been a conservative and upper caste movement (104).
• Electoral defeats in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh in 1993 due primarily to losing the OBC and Dalit vote, however, prompted the BJP to promote lower caste interests and promote many OBC and Dalit politicians within the party. The BJP reluctantly accepted the Mandal Commission expansion of reservations, paving the way to several successful alliances with OBC and Dalit parties in the 1998 election (104-105).
• The BJP has essentially recruited more politicians from the OBCs and Dalits without changed its fundamentally social outlook. Multiple politicians report than OBC and Dalit members of the BJP have been habituated to the upper caste attitudes of the core of BJP politicians. Defections of OBC and Dalit politicians to the BJP may change this in the future, however, as these politicians tend to have a very different social outlook (105).
• Caste politics is currently polarized between the wealthier OBCs, particularly the Yadav, and the other, more disadvantaged, OBCs. These other OBCs are open to different political opportunities, including alliance with the BJP, despite the fact that this party does not represent their interests. This situation is likely to endure unless OBCs can take over the BJP, a move which would likely cause the Sangh Parivar and RSS to fracture, or the most disadvantaged members of the OBCs manage to unite politically rather than remaining divided along jati lines (106).