The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) is a national political party in India. It was formed mainly to represent Bahujans (literally meaning "People in majority"), referring to people from the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Castes (OBC) as well as minorities. The party claims to be inspired by the philosophy of B. R. Ambedkar, Mahatma Jyotiba Phule, Periyar E. V. Ramasamy & Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj. The BSP was founded by charismatic leader Kanshi Ram in 1984, who was succeeded by his protégée Mayawati in 2003. The party's political symbol is an elephant. The party was the third most voted-for party in the 2014 Indian general election, but still failed to win any seats in the 16th Lok Sabha. The BSP has its main base in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

Origin of the word Bahujan

The Pali word Bahujan is notably found in the literature of Buddhist texts. Gautama Buddha used this word to guide his disciples to work for the Bahujan Hitay Bahujan Sukhay (tran. Benefit and prosperity of majority people). The word Bahujan also refers to those people who are in the majority. However, the BSP has historically drawn a loyal base of voters from Dalits. It has attempted to grow nationally as well and has met with steady success.

Bahujan Samaj Party, Nepal (Majority Society Party, Nepal) is a Nepalese political party. It is formed with inspiration of the Indian Bahujan Samaj Party. It is led by Madan Bahadur Pradhan. In the 1999 general elections it had 3 candidates. The party got 0.01% of the votes nationwide.

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The Bahujan Samaj Party (Ambedkar) was a splinter group of the Bahujan Samaj Party in Punjab and Haryana, India. The party president was Devi Dass Nahar and the general secretary was Vijay Kumar Hans (later leader of the Democratic Bharatiya Samaj Party). The party claimed to have 100,000 party workers, a gross exaggeration.

In the 2002 legislative assembly elections in Punjab, BSP(A) put up 23 candidates, who together received 20,260 votes. The BSP(A) reunited with the BSP on 31 December 2003.

In 2004, after the elections of Lok Sabha, Sh. Devi Dass Nahar along with Jia Lal Nahar, Pritam Chand and Balwant Singh Sultanpur was expelled from Bahujan Samaj Party and parted ways from BSP by refloating his BSP(Ambedkar) due to differences with Narender Kashyap national general secretary of party and state president Avtar Singh Karimpuri.

In 2009 Lok Sabha elections, BSP(A) announced its support to the SAD-BJP candidates after Sukhbir Singh Badal met with Devi Dass Nahar.