The inhuman act of a youth named Pravesh Shukla, who was caught on camera peeing on the face of a tribal labourer in Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi district, has left the Shivraj Singh Chouhan-led BJP government with no choice but to get into damage control mode, more so because the Assembly elections are just five months away. Parvesh happens to be the representative of BJP MLA Kedarnath Shukla.

Pravesh’s shameful act has not only given the opposition Congress an opportunity to corner the BJP over ‘atrocities’ against people belonging to SC/ST communities, but also a chance to present itself as the ‘sympathiser’ of the downtrodden communities in the poll-bound state.

Notably, the victim – Dasmat Rawat – belongs to the Kol tribe, which comes under the Scheduled Tribe (ST) category, and is the largest tribal group in the Vindhya region comprising seven districts — Satna, Sidhi, Singrauli, Sidhi, Umaria, Shahdol and Anuppur.

The region consists of 30 Assembly seats, out of which 24 were won by the BJP in 2018. While the ruling party is putting in all possible efforts to secure the maximum number of seats in the Vindhya region, Pravesh’s shameful act is bound to create anti-BJP sentiments among the Kol community.

The tribal communities, including Bhil, Bhilala, Gond, Korku, Baiga, Saharia, Kol and Bharia, constitute over 21 per cent of the voters in Madhya Pradesh, which has 230 Assembly constituencies. Out of these, 84 are tribal-dominated constituencies, with 47 seats reserved for ST candidates.

In 2013 elections, the BJP had won 60 out of these 84 seats (and 165 out of the 230 seats), but the numbers had slumped to 34 in 2018. The Congress, which had won 24 of the 84 seats in 2013 (and just 58 in total), improved its tally to 47 in 2018, while its rebels emerged victorious on three seats.

The Congress has grabbed the opportunity now as it has planned to take the peeing issue to the community members during campaigning.

Congress MLAs belonging to SC/ST communities are apparently charged up, trying to stoke anti-BJP sentiments among the Kol community members.

The BJP, as part of its damage control measures, has bulldozed the “illegal encroachments” of Pravesh, who has been booked under the stringent National Security Act (NSA) after the video of the act went viral on social media on Tuesday.

Notably, a couple of months back, Shivraj Singh Chouhan had perfomed a bhumi-pujan for the conservation and restoration work of the Kolgarhi Fort of tribal Kol rulers in Rewa district.

In fact, in the last couple of years, the Chouhan-led state government has implemented a host of tribal-centric initiatives, particularly named after tribal heroes, including Birsa Munda and Tantya Bheel.

These initiatives not only include restoring places associated with tribal heroes, but also other measures like self-employment schemes etc.