The decision to take back Uma Bharti was taken under the pressure from RSS at the two-day conference of national executive of BJP held in Lucknow recently.

With the appointment of Uma Bharti to lead the party campaign for Mission 2012 to capture power on its own, BJP is looking towards important lodh rajput backward community in particular and backwards in general.

BJP would like to project Uma Bharti as backward leader to counter the influence of former chief minister Kalyan Singh who after leaving BJP has formed his own party and commands tremendous influence in lodh rajput backward community.

It would be worth mentioning here that lodh rajput community to which Uma Bharti belongs, command influence in 45 assembly constituencies. The districts where Lodh community influences the voting pattern include Jalaun, Jhansi, Hamirpur in Bundelkhand region and Agra, Aligarh and Firozabad.

The other factor which favours Uma Bharti is her style of functioning which is attacking the political rivals. She was known as a firebrand speaker on Ayodhya issue which mobilized upper caste for saffron party.

But on the other hand senior leaders like Rajnath Singh, Kalraj Mishra, Lalji Tandon, Om Prakash Singh and state president Surya Pratap Shahi are unnerved with the appointment of Uma Bharti as they all find it difficult to adjust with her.

Since Uma Bharti enjoys the backing of RSS, no senior leader would take the risk of opposing her openly. But groupism and infighting cannot be ruled out

But for public consumption BJP leader distributed sweets in party office to celebrate the appointment of Uma Bharti. State president Surya Pratap Shahi said Uma would help in providing aggression to party agitations against Mayawati government in future.

BJP legislature party leader Om Prakash Singh and party spokesman Hriday Narain Dixit said party workers would feel stronger in the presence of Uma Bharti.

It may be mentioned here that BJP had utilized the service of Uma Bharti to campaign for party candidates in 2009 Lok Sabha polls although she was not in the party at that time.

Reacting to home coming of Uma Bharti, former chief minister Kalyan Singh said nobody could help BJP which was already on ventilator.

Mr Kalyan Singh who had been chief minister of UP twice, said BJP was led by those who had been defeated several times. .

“Anybody who has been defeated in successive polls cannot provide winning formula to party candidates” Kalyan Singh observed.

AICC general secretary and in charge of UP affairs Digvijay Singh in reply to a question said he was not bothered with the return of Uma Bharti as leader of campaign committee as it would affect more Kalraj Mishra and Rajnath Singh. (IPA)