Newsmaker | SP Dalit leader who triumphed over BJP in Ayodhya: Who is Awadhesh Prasad?

The Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, consecrated in January, marked the completion of one of the Sangh Parivar’s ideological goals and was initially expected to boost the BJP’s prospects in the Lok Sabha elections. But as the party took a big hit in Uttar Pradesh, with its tally almost halved, one of its most prominent losses was in the Faizabad Lok Sabha constituency of which Ayodhya is a part.

The Samajwadi Party (SP) leader who snatched the seat from the BJP in the prestige battle is veteran MLA Awadhesh Prasad who was the only candidate from a Dalit community to win from a non-reserved constituency. Prasad trumped the BJP’s two-time sitting MP Lallu Singh by 54,567 votes, riding on Dalit votes that earlier used to go to the Congress in Faizabad.

Though Prasad does not like to identify himself as just a Dalit leader, he is recognised as the Dalit face of the “Yadav party”. The 77-year-old nine-time MLA and now first-time MP, who is from the Pasi community, is among the founder members of the SP and has been constantly by party founder Mulayam Singh Yadav’s side starting in 1974.

A law graduate from Lucknow University, Prasad entered active politics at the age of 21. He joined the Bharatiya Kranti Dal led by former PM Chaudhary Charan Singh, whom he considers his “political father”, and contested his first Assembly election from Sohawal in Ayodhya district in 1974.

During Emergency, Prasad served as the Faizabad district co-convener of the anti-Emergency Sangharsh Samiti and was arrested. While in jail, his mother passed away and he failed to get parole to attend her last rites. After Emergency, he quit law to become a full-time politician. In 1981, Prasad, then a general secretary of both the Lok Dal and the Janata Party, could not