The Congress has paid a heavy price for its historic blunder of failing to see, analyse and reorient itself to the political uprising of the Backward Classes in the late 1980s, which led to its uprooting from the Hindi heartland by the Lalus and Mulayams. The situation only worsened for the party when Narendra Modi achieved what no other politician could in Independent India — the unification of the Hindu community, otherwise fragmented along caste lines.

If Rahul Gandhi’s “ jitni aabadi, utna haq ” (rights in proportion to population) slogan is an attempt to win back the support of BCs, Telangana chief minister A. Revanth Reddy’s move to raise BC reservations from the present 29 per cent to 42 per cent in rural and urban local bodies demonstrates that the party has a chance to realise

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