The slogans reflected the commitment of Kanshi Ram, the founder president of both the organisations, BAMCEF and BSP, who is also credited for creating a political space for the Dalit community in India’s complex electoral politics.

Kanshi Ram, who envisaged social empowerment before political empowerment, changed tactics in the late 1980s as he gave a call to the community to unite and capture the ‘temple of power’ (Parliament) for their emancipation. His protégé, Mayawati, also asked the Bahujan Samaj to unite and snatch the master key of power to become rulers or else, she warned, they will forever remain helpless and powerless. Both assumed monopoly over Dalit votes and considered Ambedkar their exclusive hero.

Both Kanshi Ram and Mayawati never minced words in taking on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress whom they described, to put it mildly, as unreliable.

However, this week, when the NDA government and home minister Amit Shah are in the middle of a controversy over the latter’s comment in the Rajya Sabha: “It has become a fashion today to utter Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar. If you had taken God’s name so many times, you would have got a place in heaven,” non-BSP parties have hijacked the issue. The BSP high command’s anger, which would have spilt on the streets on such an emotive issue in the past, is missing.

The Dalit community reveres Ambedkar like god; his photos are often used on wedding invitation cards by community members instead of the customary Ganesha symbol. Several statues of Ambedkar dot the state.

However, what has baffled Mayawati’s supporters and those who track BSP’s politics is her seeming lack of indignation on the raging controversy. This perception becomes jarring given that the entire Opposition has objected to the tone and tenor of Shah’s speech. The Congress party’s national president, Mallikarjun Kharge, who is himself a Dalit took the lead; Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, wearing blue t-shirts and sarees, joined the protests.

Members of Parliament from the Samajwadi Party, headed by Ram Gopal Yadav and Dimple Yadav, staged a vociferous protest outside Parliament even as the party protested in the Uttar Pradesh (UP) Vidhan Sabha.

Shah has dismissed the charges. Responding to the opposition’s attack, Shah on Wednesday accused the Congress of distorting his statement in the parliament. “Since yesterday, Congress has been presenting the facts in a distorted way, and I condemn it... Congress is anti-BR Ambedkar, it is against reservation and the Constitution. Congress also insulted Veer Savarkar. By imposing the Emergency, they violated all Constitutional values,” Shah said.

But amid all this, where were Mayawati and her party leaders? Yes, her party is not represented in the Lok Sabha or the UP Vidhan Sabha but her cadres have a history of staging street protests. Clearly, the perceived insult to Ambedkar did not infuriate the BSP like it would have in the past though they claim to be a party of Dalits for Dalits with their mission to complete Ambedkar’s dream. Even the Congress, with a considerably weakened organisation, staged demonstrations in UP.

Mayawati tweeted before addressing a press conference in which she also took on the Congress and the Opposition parties for practicing vote-bank politics to lure gullible Dalit voters. She advised Shah to consider withdrawing his words.

This soft approach to the ruling party in New Delhi could well be part of an emerging pattern. During the 2024 Lok Sabha elections also, when there was much talk about the BJP’s conspiracy to amend the Constitution if they secured 400+ seats in the Lok Sabha, Mayawati stayed put at home, hardly raising the issue in her public meetings. Her core Dalit voters were disappointed, which reflected in the poll results. As the Congress and the SP attempt to attract Dalits, disenchanted with the BSP, Mayawati’s claim on Ambedkar’s legacy seems to be weakening.

Intellectuals from the Dalit community believe that the ongoing controversy may harm the BJP politically with the party leadership out to hurriedly control the damage. Many of them like Shashi Kant Pandey of BR Ambedkar University and Satish Prakash of Meerut University believe that the BSP is suffering from terminal illness, recovery from which seems near impossible. They questioned the reason behind holding back her nephew Akash Anand from hitting the streets. “This is the right time to launch him and not keep him indoors,” they added.

Political analysts recalled how the minority government of Mayawati had aggressively pushed its Dalit agenda, much to the political discomfiture of the supporting BJP in 1995, 1997 and 2002. Her governments had lasted barely 137 days, 184 days and one year and 118 days as the BJP was compelled to withdraw support

In her first three tenures, Mayawati had concentrated on three major schemes -- completion of the Ambedkar Udyan in Lucknow- symbol of Dalit’s dignity, development of Ambedkar villages and a state-wide campaign to give the Dalits possession of land allotted to them. She had also strengthened the SC/ST Atrocities Act, upsetting the BJP’s core support base, the upper castes. But with the hope to expand the BSP-BJP tie-up from UP to the national level, the late BJP Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had remained on her side, much against the wishes of senior leader LK Advani.

The situation seems to have altered since 2014. Mayawati’s political idleness has cost the party heavily as the BSP has continued on an election losing spree. The Ambedkar controversy had given her the opportunity to restart the Bahujan movement that the iconic leader had begun and decades later, the BSP had promised to complete. That was not to be. Not this time. The firebrand in Mayawati seems to be in atrophy.