Political History of Jatavs (Scheduled Castes) in Agra, Uttar Pradesh before BSP, Part 2 ‘Post Independent’ – The Municipal Corporation

The third element in the redefinition of the social situation was the formation of the Republican Party of Agra in 1958. It was formed as a branch of the All-India Republican Party and as the succor of the Scheduled Castes Federation. For Jatavs of Uttar Pradesh and Mahars of Maharashtra, both of whom were followers of Ambedkar, the formation of Republican Party was an adaptive response to a political system in which their interests were not being realized nor articulated to the extent that they desired.

In 1959 Agra City became a municipal corporation under the new Municipal Corporation Act of the state of Uttar Pradesh. This same year, elections were held for fifty-four members of the Municipal Corporation. The Republican Party won seventeen seats, six of which were reserved for the Scheduled Castes. Of these seventeen, all non-Jatavs, were supported by the Party, but soon after the election, they severed any connection with the Party, thus bringing the Republican total down to thirteen members. There were also three independent Jatav candidates who periodically associated themselves with the Party and derived support from it. Thus there were six effective members of a Republican-Jatav coalition in the Corporation. To this number one other Jatav was co-opted, bringing membership of the coalition to seventeen. One member of its total member is a Mohammedan, now playing peripherally associated with the group, and one other is a member of a merchant caste or Vaisya, leaving fifteen Jatavs in coalition.