The BJP has decided to have its new government in Haryana sworn in on Valmiki Jayanti, which falls on Thursday, coinciding with a call from RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat for a fresh outreach to Dalits.

The twin moves reflect a renewed effort by the RSS-BJP to court Dalits and bring them under the wider Hindutva umbrella to counter the Opposition’s campaign for a nationwide caste census.

The BJP believes that it suffered heavily in this year’s general election because of a Dalit apprehension, fanned by the Opposition, that the party would amend the Constitution and abolish reservations if it returned to power with a large majority.

Bhagwat, in his annual Vijayadashami address on Saturday, reached out to Dalits while alleging a “deep State” effort to divide the country on caste lines.

“Why should Valmiki Jayanti be celebrated only in Valmiki colonies? Valmiki wrote the Ramayana for the entire Hindu society, and such festivals should therefore be celebrated together by the entire Hindu society,” Bhagwat said. “We (the RSS) will go to society with this message.”

On the same day that Bhagwat made these comments, the BJP announced that the new Haryana government would be sworn in on October 17 — a date that coincides with the birth anniversary of Rishi Valmiki, celebrated every year by some Dalit communities.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to attend the swearing-in.

This BJP’s latest overtures to Dalits come ahead of Assembly elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand, expected in November, and months after the general election stripped away the party’s majority in the Lok Sabha.

The surprise victory in Haryana has come as a morale booster for the BJP, emboldening it to hit back at the Opposition.

A BJP leader claimed the Haryana results suggested that the Dalits had backed the party.

“The Opposition’s propaganda that the BJP would change ‘Ambedkar’s Constitution’ and end reservations if the Modi government secured a big majority hurt us badly in the Lok Sabha polls. We are determined to defeat this effort by the Opposition,” he said.

The BJP’s third straight victory in Haryana is particularly spectacular since the party had won just 5 of the state’s 10 Lok Sabha seats in the general election four months earlier, with its vote share witnessing a slide.

Its internal assessments suggest that the party’s move to unite the OBCs and Dalits against the dominant Jats had turned the tide.

“We want to use the same strategy in Maharashtra where the dominant Maratha community appears to be backing the Opposition alliance,” a BJP leader said.

He said that RSS andBJP cadres in Maharashtra were working to polarise the OBCs and Dalits againstthe Marathas, who aredemanding OBC status.

Bringing the Dalit and tribal communities under the wider Hindutva umbrella has been a long-term project with the RSS and the BJP, both of which feel that the Opposition’s push for a caste census poses a danger to this programme.

The RSS-BJP sees the Rahul Gandhi-led Opposition’s recent fillip to caste-centric politics as a “conspiracy to divide Hindus”, which both Bhagwat and Modi have spoken out against.

In his victory speech after the Haryana poll results, Modi had accused the Congress of using caste to divide the country and claimed that the party “will never allow a Dalit, tribal or an OBC to become PM”.

Bhagwat echoed him in his Vijayadashami address, accusing “some political parties” of trying to divide the country along caste lines to further their “selfish interests”.