- Manna Lal Rawat rose from Rajasthan transport officer to BJP ST wing national president quickly
- He won Udaipur Lok Sabha seat in 2024 by over 2.6 lakh votes as a first-time MP
- Bharatiya Adivasi Party gained ground, winning 3 Assembly seats and Banswara LS seat in 2024
Till two years ago he wasn't even in active politics. Manna Lal Rawat, the BJP's national president of the Scheduled Tribes (ST) wing, was an additional commissioner in the transport department in Rajasthan.
In 2024 he quit the services to join the BJP and was almost immediately made the party's Lok Sabha candidate from Udaipur, an ST-reserved seat.
Manna Lal won the election by over 2.6 lakh votes.
But more significant has been his sudden catapult into the national team as president of the BJP's ST Morcha.
For a first-time MP who has maintained a low profile, it's a meteoric rise. The symbolism of a tribal leader from South Rajasthan being picked to head the crucial ST Morcha is itself loaded.
The BJP's tribal vote bank, especially in South Rajasthan, is metamorphosing, making its core support base highly unpredictable, and Manna Lal Rawat has the task of consolidating and bringing the shifting vote bank back to the BJP fold.
Manna Lal's close proximity to the Vanvasi Kalyan Parishad should help him address the issue, but the electoral arithmetic is something the BJP is definitely worried about.
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The Bharatiya Adivasi Party (BAP), formed in 2023 as a splinter group of the Bharatiya Tribal Party (BTP), has seen a rapid rise in vote share and political power across South Rajasthan's tribal belt.
From winning two Assembly seats as the BTP in 2018, the splinter group expanded its regional footprint, capturing three Assembly seats in 2023, and one MLA seat in Madhya Pradesh.
Rajkumar Roat of BAP, the MP from Banswara
After Rajkumar Roat won the Banswara Lok Sabha seat in 2024, defeating both the Congress and the BJP, the BAP became a challenge to both mainstream political parties.
In the 28 Assembly seats that dominate the Southern Rajasthan tribal belt, the BAP has radically disrupted the traditional BJP-Congress bipolar contest.
In the 2023 state elections, of the 28 seats, the BJP got 17, the Congress 7 and the BAP 3.
But the vote share tells a different story. The BAP won the seats of Chorasi, Aspur and Dhariyawad, but its exceptional individual vote shares are the real cause of concern for the BJP.
- Chorasi: BAP secured a landslide victory with 53.92% of the total votes polled.
- Aspur: BAP won comfortably by capturing 46.7% of the vote share.
- Dhariyawad: BAP clinched the seat with 37.67% vote share.
The electoral math in the Lok Sabha was even more worrying for the mainstream parties.
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In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections the BJP's vote share in South Rajasthan was 21.22%. In 2024 it came down by 6 percentage points.
For the Congress, the fall was even more dramatic. From a vote share of 28.27% in 2019, it came down to 24.53% in 2024.
The BAP was emerging as a third alternative in South Rajasthan.
Manna Lal Rawat
The Banswara Lok Sabha proved to be a game-changer. In the 2024 general elections, the BAP won the massive Banswara-Dungarpur parliamentary seat, which spans 8 of the 28 ST-dominated Assembly segments, with a margin of nearly 2.5 lakh votes. It had finally arrived with a regional vote share that had crossed the fifty percent mark in core tribal sectors.
That the BJP has taken note of this shift is the reason behind Manna Lal Rawat's selection.
Speaking exclusively to NDTV after he was made head of the ST Morcha, Manna Lal Rawat said: "These things have been taken note of. The BJP still maintains its hold on the tribals. If you see the seats in West Bengal, the BJP won all 16 reserved seats. We will address the issue of South Rajasthan. The BAP is talking about a Bhil Pradesh. We will work within the framework of the Constitution and we will talk about development to consolidate our vote bank. Under the leadership of Modiji there are many schemes to improve agriculture, provide employment and stop migration of tribals. This is our focus, not a separatist agenda that smacks of a red corridor. We will talk about kaushal vikas."
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BAP leader Rajkumar Roat counters Manna Lal's argument, insisting that the BJP has tried to take the tribals away from their core identity.
"The BJP has tried to create divisions in the tribal community. They want to see tribals as part of the larger Hindu fold. But the tribal identity has nothing to do with religion. We have our own practices and customs. This is not about Hindu, Muslim and Christian. The BAP will advocate a Bhil Pradesh which will comprise parts of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra," he said.
Map of 'Bhil Pradesh' shared by BAP MP Rajkumar Roat
It is this very "separatist" identity that hits at the core of the Vanvasi Kalyan Parishad, an affiliate of the RSS.
Manna Lal Rawat said: "We realise the need to engage with the tribal youth. The BAP says many things on social media. They share a map of the Bhil Pradesh that was made during British colonial rule. What is the relevance of boundaries drawn by the British? These things create divisions in society. The BJP, on the other hand, is celebrating and upholding tribal culture by commemorating the Janjati Gaurav Diwas each year."
Manna Lal Rawat's new role, therefore, is not merely about the BJP's tribal arithmetic in Rajasthan. With the BAP looking beyond the state with its Bhil Pradesh agenda, the low-profile MP from South Rajasthan could now find himself at the centre of the BJP's larger battle for the tribal vote.
