Following the Sachar Committee’s report, the Congress had been leaning towards reservations for minorities, as is evident from the provisions in the Lok Pal Bill and its campaign in UP. In the UP election campaign, BSP leader Mayawati’s slogan was ‘Share according to participation’—“jiski jitni bhagedari, uski utni hissedari”. The BSP’s Dalit Prerna Sthal project, brimming with Buddhist symbolism, goes beyond caste: it’s a pan-Buddhist cultural community rather than a religious community with Buddhist practices. Extending quotas for poor among dominant-caste voters, reservations were no longer the main political framework of the BSP. It’s a combination of the politics of belonging and of belongings, an economic slogan meant for the two electoral constituencies; there was also a perceptibly higher allocation of seats to the Rajput-Brahmin combine. The BJP, on the other hand, with its new swadeshi paradigm and the ‘Hamare Sapnon ka Uttar Pradesh’ (the UP of our dreams) project, was sending its message to OBCs, while focusing its groundwork among the Dalits, without being explicit about caste. Similarly, in Bihar, the JD(U) forged a social coalition with the dominant castes, while simultaneously focusing on Dalit subcastes, Pasmanda (Dalit) Muslims, as well as Mahadalit, with attempts to give it a constitutional category.