Of caste politics, limits of inclusion, symbolic shifts, structural barriers in Indian polls

 

Taking a fresh look at the last Lok Sabha elections, a new paper published in "Indian Politics & Policy" (Vol. 5, No. 1, Summer 2025), a research periodical of the Washington DC-based think tank Policy Studies Organization, has claimed that the 2024 polls brought the politics of caste and inclusion to the forefront as never before.

The paper, titled "Caste, Social Justice, and the Politics of Inclusion in the 2024 Indian General Election," was authored by Gilles Verniers, Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Amherst College, Massachusetts. It states that the NDA, led by the BJP, and the opposition INDIA bloc, led by the Congress, were seen vying to project themselves as champions of marginalized communities.

The political scientist argues that while INDIA appeared to “beat the NDA in the game of inclusion,” the representational gains were ultimately constrained by deep-rooted structural limitations in Indian electoral politics.

According to Verniers, the two alliances presented voters with distinct narratives. The BJP-led NDA emphasized a model of political inclusion that integrated Hindu castes under a broad religious identity, while also moving India’s welfare policy framework away from caste-based redistributive justice. INDIA, by contrast, campaigned on the need for a caste census and caste-conscious welfare policies to address entrenched inequalities.

Candidates' representation in 2024 polls

Verniers notes, “The opposition conflated these questions into a matter of protecting the Constitution after a few BJP officials declared that they would use their future two-thirds majority to amend it.”

The data underscores how caste played a central role in both alliance strategies. For the first time since Independence, the share of Other Backward Class (OBC) MPs in the Lok Sabha matched the number of upper-caste MPs, with each occupying roughly 26 percent of the seats. This represents a modest but symbolically significant shift, especially given that the share of upper-caste MPs declined from 28.5 percent in 2019 to 25.8 percent in 2024.

The NDA nominated 31.1 percent upper-caste candidates, while INDIA restricted this figure to 19.3 percent. In terms of MPs, 33.2 percent of NDA MPs were from upper castes, compared to just 12.9 percent for INDIA. Meanwhile, INDIA nominated 14 percent of its candidates from religious minorities, compared to the NDA’s mere 2.7 percent. Verniers says, “There are no religious minority MPs in the NDA, except for the MP from Arunachal West, Mr. Kiren Rijiju.”

One of the sharpest electoral shifts occurred in Uttar Pradesh, a traditional political bellwether. The BJP and its allies lost 30 of their previously held 64 seats. The Samajwadi Party, aligned with INDIA, won 37 seats, while Congress added six more. INDIA’s caste-inclusive strategy was particularly visible in this state. The SP fielded 29 OBC and two Jat candidates, 16 Scheduled Castes, and four Muslims, while limiting upper-caste candidates to 11.

“Nineteen of the 29 Samajwadi Party OBC candidates won,” Verniers notes, adding that “upper-caste representation in Uttar Pradesh significantly decreased, while OBC representation surpassed it for the first time.” In 2024, OBC MPs from the state made up 36.3 percent of its Lok Sabha delegation, while upper castes dropped to 31.3 percent—down from 38.8 percent in 2019 and over 43 percent in earlier years.

Caste, community representation in Uttar Pradesh

Despite these strides, Verniers is cautious about reading these shifts as transformative. “The unexpected performance of the Samajwadi Party... largely contributed to the variation in OBC representation nationally,” he explains, warning against extrapolating the Uttar Pradesh story to the whole country. Thus, in many other states, nomination strategies between the alliances were not dramatically different—especially where intermediary castes like Jats, Marathas, and Lingayats dominate.

In terms of gender representation, progress also stalled. Only 73 women were elected in 2024, down from 79 in 2019, marking the first decline since 1996. Women made up just 15.7 percent of NDA candidates and 13.2 percent for INDIA. Among the elected MPs, both alliances saw identical ratios: 11.9 percent. “More women contested than in 2019, but so did men,” Verniers observes, noting the challenges women face in both gaining nominations and sustaining long-term political careers.

Financial elitism continues to plague Indian electoral politics. According to data from the Association for Democratic Reforms, 504 of 543 MPs are self-declared crorepatis, and the average net assets declared were ₹11.7 crore. Intermediary caste MPs were the wealthiest on average, followed by upper castes and Muslims, while SC, ST, and OBC MPs reported significantly lower wealth levels. Verniers writes that “the inclusiveness of the new Parliament is mitigated by the enduring elitist character of political recruitment.”

Even within the opposition, challenges to deepening inclusion remain. While INDIA nominated more religious minorities, the overall number of Muslim MPs declined from 27 in 2019 to 24 in 2024. Congress, which had previously distributed over 8 percent of its tickets to Muslims, reduced that figure to just 5.7 percent. “Minority representation within non-NDA parties keeps decreasing, and so does the representation of women,” Verniers concludes.

The author, who is also a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi, emphasizes that while efforts at broader inclusion are visible, they remain incomplete and often symbolic. “Despite efforts to become more inclusive, elite bias in political recruitment persists,” he states, adding that the observed changes are meaningful but largely concentrated in a few North Indian states. The 2024 election may mark a rhetorical shift toward inclusive politics, but its structural realities still favor the privileged few.