As hundreds of aspirants from Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and Scheduled Caste (SC) communities crawled on their bellies in the scorching heat outside Uttar Pradesh Education Minister Sandeep Singh’s residence in Lucknow on Monday, the Samajwadi Party (SP) moved swiftly to fold the protest into its broader political pitch through the “PDA Arakshan Audit” ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections.
The visuals from the protest over the stalled 69,000 assistant teachers’ recruitment process have provided fresh ammunition to SP chief Akhilesh Yadav’s ongoing “PDA Aarakshan Audit” campaign. Through the initiative, the party is attempting to reclaim the social justice narrative and consolidate non-Yadav OBCs, Most Backward Classes (MBCs), Dalits and minorities under its PDA — Pichda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak — umbrella.
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For years, the BJP accused the Akhilesh Yadav-led SP government of promoting “Yadav bharti” — favouring members of the Yadav community in government recruitment and postings between 2012 and 2017. The narrative is widely seen to have helped the BJP consolidate non-Yadav OBCs and MBCs, while also expanding its support among non-Jatav Dalits.
In a significant political counteroffensive, Yadav has now launched the SP’s “PDA Aarakshan Audit” campaign, accusing the BJP government of systematically weakening reservation policies and denying backward communities their share in jobs. The move is widely seen as an attempt to turn one of the BJP’s most effective political attacks from the 2017 and 2022 Assembly elections back on the ruling party itself.
“This booklet explains, with evidence, to millions of PDA (Pichda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak) youth how the Uttar Pradesh BJP government is snatching away your constitutional right to reservation — from you, your sons, daughters, and daughters-in-law. It shows how Baba Saheb Ambedkar’s tool of equality — reservation — is being gradually weakened. We hope you will share this booklet with your loved ones who are at risk of losing their reservation or who have already lost it,” the SP chief says in his appeal published in the booklet.
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The booklet also claims that more than 11,500 reserved posts meant for PDA communities were allegedly denied across 22 recruitment drives conducted under successive BJP governments. SP leaders describe the document as evidence of what they call the BJP’s “anti-backward” and “pro-upper caste” approach.
Since the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Yadav has aggressively foregrounded the PDA identity as the SP’s central political framework. Party insiders say the “reservation audit” marks the next phase of that strategy by linking social justice politics directly to jobs, reservation and representation.
Senior SP leaders argue that the booklet has been designed specifically to counter the BJP’s long-standing allegation that SP governments distributed jobs to one caste.
“The BJP kept accusing us of ‘Yadav bharti’ in jobs and postings, but they could never prove those allegations. Now we are asking them questions with proper documents in hand. This booklet will reach every Assembly constituency and every OBC youth in the state. The aim is to expose the BJP government’s anti-OBC and pro-upper caste mindset,” an SP leader said.
According to SP leaders, the BJP successfully weaponised the perception that Yadavs cornered jobs meant for MBCs. The SP now wants to project that the actual erosion of reservation benefits took place during BJP rule.
“‘Naukri Yadav kha jaate hain’ (Yadavs get all the jobs) — this narrative was spread continuously. But today, recruitment data itself shows that backward communities suffered the biggest losses during BJP rule,” another SP functionary said.
BJP’s counter
Sensing the political significance of the issue, the BJP has intensified its own OBC outreach campaign.
During the recent Uttar Pradesh Cabinet expansion, three of the six newly inducted ministers belonged to OBC communities — a move widely viewed as an attempt to reinforce the BJP’s backward caste outreach ahead of the 2027 polls.
Soon after, the Yogi Adityanath government approved the formation of a dedicated OBC Commission to determine reservation for local body elections in compliance with the Supreme Court-mandated “triple test” requirement.
Headed by retired Justice Ram Avatar Singh, the commission has been asked to submit its report within six months — a timeline that politically coincides with preparations for the Assembly elections.
The BJP has also deployed OBC and Dalit ministers, along with leaders from allied caste-based parties, to counter Yadav’s allegations on reservation and recruitment.
On Wednesday, as Yadav addressed the first in a series of press conferences on the “PDA audit”, BJP leaders and allies launched coordinated counterattacks.
Sanjay Nishad, whose NISHAD Party is an NDA ally, accused the SP and the INDIA bloc of pursuing “appeasement politics” at the cost of OBC rights. He alleged that Yadav wanted reservation “on the basis of the religion brought by the Mughals” and claimed that the SP would face the same political decline as the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in West Bengal. Nishad also invoked the legacy of Phoolan Devi, alleging that she had been sidelined by the SP.
Another prominent OBC face in the BJP government, Minister Swatanra Dev Singh, alleged that recruitment processes during the SP regime were manipulated by a “chacha-bhatija” (uncle-nephew) network. In contrast, he claimed that the Adityanath government had conducted nearly nine lakh recruitments transparently and on merit.
Minister of State Asim Arun also attacked the PDA audit campaign, arguing that the “real audit report”
of SP rule was already visible in the alleged police recruitment irregularities between 2004 and 2007.
He further alleged that under the SP government, “one particular caste” dominated recruitments through the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission (UPPSC).