My wife is an MD, studied at one of the top 5-10 medical colleges in India and works at one of the biggest & most prestigious hospital chains in India (read extortionist). Yet, she is a committed voter of BSP. She makes sure to vote every single election and always for BSP. 1/n

Same with her family - all highly educated folks... engineers, doctors, civil servants- alumni of some of the best universities in India. Think IITs, AIIMs etc. Committed BSP voters. I asked all of them why they do that. I got a very strange answer. 2/n

The first argument is- Look, UP is like that. Upper castes vote BJP, Yadavs vote SP, Muslims vote SP and we vote BSP. When I press and ask why such highly educated folks behave like a herd of sheep, I get a very different answer. The best was by my MIL who is an MA in Hindi 3/n

She says that the quality of netas in UP is very poor & that you don't get candidates or CMs who are fair, or care about things like roads, jobs etc - everyone watches out only for themselves and their vote banks. So, they have to pick one out of 3 options 4/n

The first is SP whose DNA is that of thuggery and extortion. They patronize Yadavs and Muslims, appointing them to posts ranging from DMs to peons. Law & order is poor and they develop only their areas (which they do). So, ruled out for them. 5/n

The next is BJP which appoints Upper castes in general but under Yogi-only Thakurs to key posts. Law and order is much better than under SP but that is only true for UC areas and not Dalit or lower-OBC villages (didn't know that you had villages based on caste). 6/n

Apparently, getting an FIR lodged in a village or having a road repaired happens only if your party is in power and doesn't happen if the accused is from the ruling party. Particularly true when SP is in power (I am told). Next comes BSP 7/n

My MIL agrees that Mayawati is corrupt, changes sides etc. However, when she was CM, cops were forced to register FIRs lodged by Dalits, Jatav areas saw development and Jatavs were appointed to key posts- doing the community a lot of good. Law and order was the best under her 8/n

I ask if Mayawati was fair to other castes. She says that she would pick on Yadavs & Thakurs who were the biggest gundas under SP, but that this restored the balance as each community got turns at power, allowing balance. I asked if she would ever vote for another party 9/n

She says that the day she feels that a leader would treat all castes equally and focus on development, she would make sure that her entire family would vote for that leader. Till then, she would vote for BSP. 10/10