Has UP's economy been inclusive enough to re-elect Mayawati?
t's been an extraordinary week, even by the standards of Uttar Pradesh politics. Chief Minister Mayawati upped her tally of ministerial sackings to 20.
Barely days after she sacked Babu Singh Kushwaha, one of her closest aides for decades, the BJP took him under its wing. This was the same Kushwaha whom the BJP had heavily criticised a few days earlier for his alleged involvement in the burgeoning multi-crore scam involving the siphoning off of funds for the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM).
The NRHM scam itself has resulted in two, possibly three, murders and earlier this week, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed FIRs against a bunch of bureaucrats, and conducted raids across UP and Delhi. Coming a week after the Election Commission announced polling dates for UP, the campaigning season could not have gotten off to a more hectic start.
But here's something that's getting little press, much less than filching welfare funds or caste calculations, but that will play a significant role in polling booths, UP's economy. Some of the most fascinating undercurrents in the state's poll politics can be found only if one, first, looks at economic and business data and, second, digs deep into them.
7% Growth Enough?
Mayawati enters the election season with one big economic plus point. By 2008-09 (the last year for which data is available and which was a recession year for the Indian economy), UP had completed three years of 7%-plus growth. "This is the highest growth UP has ever recorded," points out AK Singh, director of the Giri Institute of Development Studies in Lucknow.
Even if the state's economy has slowed since then, the average growth in these past few years will still be well above what it was in the 1990s. "Growth in UP is occurring after a long period of stagnation," Singh says. And while the shift to a higher growth path began before Mayawati came to power, she could well reap some of the benefits at the polling booth.
Or so it seems. Drill deeper into that 7% number and troubling anomalies begin to surface. While the data stops at 2008-09, there is little evidence, at least from the people that ET on Sunday spoke to, that the structure of the UP economy, or its sources of growth, has shifted much in the past two years.
The four big contenders: Advantages and Disadvantages 
Mayawati came to power in 2007 on the basis of an inclusive politics which welded castes from across the hierarchy under the banner of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). But have her economic policies been as inclusive? That's the key economic question for the elections.
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t's been an extraordinary week, even by the standards of Uttar Pradesh politics. Chief Minister Mayawati upped her tally of ministerial sackings to 20.
Barely days after she sacked Babu Singh Kushwaha, one of her closest aides for decades, the BJP took him under its wing. This was the same Kushwaha whom the BJP had heavily criticised a few days earlier for his alleged involvement in the burgeoning multi-crore scam involving the siphoning off of funds for the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM).
The NRHM scam itself has resulted in two, possibly three, murders and earlier this week, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed FIRs against a bunch of bureaucrats, and conducted raids across UP and Delhi. Coming a week after the Election Commission announced polling dates for UP, the campaigning season could not have gotten off to a more hectic start.
But here's something that's getting little press, much less than filching welfare funds or caste calculations, but that will play a significant role in polling booths, UP's economy. Some of the most fascinating undercurrents in the state's poll politics can be found only if one, first, looks at economic and business data and, second, digs deep into them.
7% Growth Enough?
Mayawati enters the election season with one big economic plus point. By 2008-09 (the last year for which data is available and which was a recession year for the Indian economy), UP had completed three years of 7%-plus growth. "This is the highest growth UP has ever recorded," points out AK Singh, director of the Giri Institute of Development Studies in Lucknow.
Even if the state's economy has slowed since then, the average growth in these past few years will still be well above what it was in the 1990s. "Growth in UP is occurring after a long period of stagnation," Singh says. And while the shift to a higher growth path began before Mayawati came to power, she could well reap some of the benefits at the polling booth.
Or so it seems. Drill deeper into that 7% number and troubling anomalies begin to surface. While the data stops at 2008-09, there is little evidence, at least from the people that ET on Sunday spoke to, that the structure of the UP economy, or its sources of growth, has shifted much in the past two years.
Barely days after she sacked Babu Singh Kushwaha, one of her closest aides for decades, the BJP took him under its wing. This was the same Kushwaha whom the BJP had heavily criticised a few days earlier for his alleged involvement in the burgeoning multi-crore scam involving the siphoning off of funds for the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM).
The NRHM scam itself has resulted in two, possibly three, murders and earlier this week, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed FIRs against a bunch of bureaucrats, and conducted raids across UP and Delhi. Coming a week after the Election Commission announced polling dates for UP, the campaigning season could not have gotten off to a more hectic start.
But here's something that's getting little press, much less than filching welfare funds or caste calculations, but that will play a significant role in polling booths, UP's economy. Some of the most fascinating undercurrents in the state's poll politics can be found only if one, first, looks at economic and business data and, second, digs deep into them.
7% Growth Enough?
Mayawati enters the election season with one big economic plus point. By 2008-09 (the last year for which data is available and which was a recession year for the Indian economy), UP had completed three years of 7%-plus growth. "This is the highest growth UP has ever recorded," points out AK Singh, director of the Giri Institute of Development Studies in Lucknow.
Even if the state's economy has slowed since then, the average growth in these past few years will still be well above what it was in the 1990s. "Growth in UP is occurring after a long period of stagnation," Singh says. And while the shift to a higher growth path began before Mayawati came to power, she could well reap some of the benefits at the polling booth.
Or so it seems. Drill deeper into that 7% number and troubling anomalies begin to surface. While the data stops at 2008-09, there is little evidence, at least from the people that ET on Sunday spoke to, that the structure of the UP economy, or its sources of growth, has shifted much in the past two years.
The four big contenders: Advantages and Disadvantages
Mayawati came to power in 2007 on the basis of an inclusive politics which welded castes from across the hierarchy under the banner of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). But have her economic policies been as inclusive? That's the key economic question for the elections.
Page1 of 7
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