On Wednesday, these will roll out, flagged off by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, to make inroads into what has been Mayawati's turf.
On the birth anniversary of Dalit leader BR Ambedkar, Gandhi and his party will flag off 10 state-wife yatras. The birthday celebrations are a politically correct excuse to launch the campaign for the state elections, now just two years away.
The UP Chief Minister, fiery at the best of times, is cranking up the rhetoric.
Ambedkar Nagar is her home constituency. And Ambedkar's statue lies in the area demarcated by her for the Bahujan Samajwadi Party's felicitations.
Barely 400 metres from the spot where Gandhi will send his teams out in their raths, is where Mayawati is hosting protests against the Women's Reservation Bill - pushed through the Rajya Sabha at the insistence of Sonia Gandhi. The bill sets aside 33 per cent of seats in parliament and state assemblies for women. Mayawati rejects it because it does not have a quota for Dalit women.
But her image as that of a champion of Dalits has tarnished a little among her voters, and the Congress is grabbing that as its main offense. In 2007, in the state elections, it was a combination of Dalits and Brahmins that swept Mayawati into power. In the general elections last year, the incongruous alliance was tiring. Fifty-six per cent of the state's Dalits did not vote, unhappy because they believed Brahmins were enjoying new power in a party that was meant to promote the interests of the castes and classes that had traditionally been overlooked.
An unnerved Mayawati has responded by indicating that 42 Brahmin representatives of her party in the state assembly will not be given tickets in the next state election. But the Congress everyday presents a carefully-calibrated narrative: of a self-assertive politician who abused the power Dalits gave her for jewels, garlands worth lakhs, monuments built for crores.
The Congress' calculation is that the Brahmins, now being shunned by the BSP, combined with the Dalits who're disappointed by Mayawati may lend themselves to a new vote.
What nobody's counting out, however, is Mayawati's determination and her ability to present herself as a woman of the masses, even when that link is not at its strongest.
