His mahadalit base suspect, the Bihar CM needs both Muslim vote and some upper caste backing to retain power. That combination will be impossible to achieve in a polarised fray.
FirstPost, 28 October, 2013
Bihar is poised for a four-cornered fight in 2014. Lalu Yadav clearly feels betrayed by the Congress. Rabri Devi, however, sent a political signal by asserting that she and her son Tejaswi would run the RJD in “saheb’s absence as Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are guiding the Congress”. But it is unlikely that the Congress will tie up with a tainted RJD after the ordinance fiasco and an oh-so-righteous intervention by Rahul Gandhi.
For some time, the Congress leadership and Nitish Kumar have been warming to each other. But insiders say Nitish is no political novice to compromise his post-poll leverage — and chances of emerging as a non-Congress, non-BJP prime ministerial candidate — by opting for a pre-poll alliance with the Congress. The BJP, of course, will have to go it alone.
How does a four-cornered fight suit the parties? Without Lalu leading the campaign, the RJD will be hamstrung. By trusting the control of the party to wife Rabri, sons Tejaswi and Tej Pratap and daughter Misa, Lalu has slighted veteran leaders such as Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, Shakuni Choudhary and Abdul Bari Siddiqui. Among them, the three have considerable command over Thakur, Koeri and Muslim votes, respectively. But they may not be comfortable taking orders from the family.
The Yadavs may yet stick with Lalu. They never voted for Nitish whose sop schemes for Mahadalits compromised their privileged status as the chosen ones under Lalu. But the Yadavs have been susceptible to Hindutva rhetoric. Most major Hindu-Muslim riots in Bihar were between Muslims and Yadavs. A backward caste leader in Narendra Modi may hold special appeal for them.
With Lalu out of active politics, will the Yadavs trust the RJD to defend their caste interests? Or will they shift allegiance to the BJP? While it will ultimately depend on how effectively Modi pitches himself – and reports suggest that the spontaneous turnout pleasantly surprised the BJP yesterday – in Bihar, a not-so-subtle shift is already underway. Last month, RJD leader and MLC Nawal Kishore Yadav risked suspension to praise Modi as India’s best political choice. Even Sadhu Yadav found his way to the Gujarat CM. However, the state BJP leaders, particularly Sushil Modi, are not keen to welcome the criminal Yadav elements to the BJP fold.
The Muslim vote, the other RJD stronghold, is likely to stay undecided till late. The RJD victory in Maharajganj by-election in June showed that the minority has not abandoned Lalu. Even his conviction, say insiders, has not diminished the RJD chief’s acceptability among Muslims. But if they sense a shift of the Yadav vote towards Modi, they are likely to jump the sinking RJD ship to back the JD(U).
But that does not solve Nitish’s problem. His predicament is evident from his refusal to take a clear stand on the acquittal of the Ranvir Sena members accused in the Lakshmanpur Bathe massacre case. Last year, after the murder of Ranvir Sena chief Brahmeshwar Singh, he did not even attempt to control the mayhem unleashed by Singh’s followers in Ara and Patna. His cabinet colleague Giriraj Singh praised the slain Ranvir Sena chief as a true Gandhian.
Apart from Nitish’s core backward caste constituency of 32 percent voters, a good section of the upper castes also backed the ruling alliance in the last two elections, thanks to the presence of the BJP in the coalition. Now that the JD(U) is on its own, this support has become suspect. Nitish’s desperate bid to woo Bhumihars and Rajputs with key positions has not helped.
Soon after Brahmeshwar’s death, his son Indubhushan Singh became the president of Akhil Bharatiya Rashtrawadi Kisan Sanghathan, a front organisation of the Ranvir Sena, and charged two JD(U) MLAs with plotting the murder. This June, Singh hosted BJP MLAs on the first death anniversary of his father and vowed to unite Bhumihars against the government.
Meanwhile, the core constituency has also weakened. Like Lalu, Nitish tried his own brand of social engineering by creating two new backward categories — Ati Pichhra and Mahadalits. Offering them sops earned him early dividends until the sheen of his Mahadalit Vikas Yojana wore off due to rampant corruption and shoddy implementation.
Clearly, Nitish is faced with a three-pronged challenge: retaining his waning support base among the mahadalits, holding on to some upper caste vote after parting ways with the BJP and ensuring that the Muslim vote does not swing the RJD way. Of the three, staking claim to the 16 percent Muslim vote seems to be the easiest, particularly since the gravitation of Yadav votes towards the BJP is a distinct possibility.
What can be the potential impact of Sunday’s blasts on these equations? Will Nitish crack down hard if it is indeed Indian Mujahideen’s Darbhanga module at work? Will he be tempted to echo certain Congress loudmouths who were prompt to accuse the BJP of some sort of inside job? Neither. If anything, a communally charged campaign with rhetoric of internal terrorism flying thick will doom Nitish’s already sagging prospects.
Obviously, the JD(U) cannot afford to alienate the minorities by competing with the BJP for the upper caste votes. Not after parting ways with Modi for secularism’s sake. But, given his weakening backward caste base, only Muslim vote will not see Nitish through. He will also need some upper caste support. Achieving that combination is anyway a tough ask; in a communally polarised election, it will be impossible. More than anyone else, it is Nitish the administrator who can help Nitish the politician today.
FirstPost, 28 October, 2013
Bihar is poised for a four-cornered fight in 2014. Lalu Yadav clearly feels betrayed by the Congress. Rabri Devi, however, sent a political signal by asserting that she and her son Tejaswi would run the RJD in “saheb’s absence as Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are guiding the Congress”. But it is unlikely that the Congress will tie up with a tainted RJD after the ordinance fiasco and an oh-so-righteous intervention by Rahul Gandhi.
For some time, the Congress leadership and Nitish Kumar have been warming to each other. But insiders say Nitish is no political novice to compromise his post-poll leverage — and chances of emerging as a non-Congress, non-BJP prime ministerial candidate — by opting for a pre-poll alliance with the Congress. The BJP, of course, will have to go it alone.
How does a four-cornered fight suit the parties? Without Lalu leading the campaign, the RJD will be hamstrung. By trusting the control of the party to wife Rabri, sons Tejaswi and Tej Pratap and daughter Misa, Lalu has slighted veteran leaders such as Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, Shakuni Choudhary and Abdul Bari Siddiqui. Among them, the three have considerable command over Thakur, Koeri and Muslim votes, respectively. But they may not be comfortable taking orders from the family.
The Yadavs may yet stick with Lalu. They never voted for Nitish whose sop schemes for Mahadalits compromised their privileged status as the chosen ones under Lalu. But the Yadavs have been susceptible to Hindutva rhetoric. Most major Hindu-Muslim riots in Bihar were between Muslims and Yadavs. A backward caste leader in Narendra Modi may hold special appeal for them.
The Muslim vote, the other RJD stronghold, is likely to stay undecided till late. The RJD victory in Maharajganj by-election in June showed that the minority has not abandoned Lalu. Even his conviction, say insiders, has not diminished the RJD chief’s acceptability among Muslims. But if they sense a shift of the Yadav vote towards Modi, they are likely to jump the sinking RJD ship to back the JD(U).
But that does not solve Nitish’s problem. His predicament is evident from his refusal to take a clear stand on the acquittal of the Ranvir Sena members accused in the Lakshmanpur Bathe massacre case. Last year, after the murder of Ranvir Sena chief Brahmeshwar Singh, he did not even attempt to control the mayhem unleashed by Singh’s followers in Ara and Patna. His cabinet colleague Giriraj Singh praised the slain Ranvir Sena chief as a true Gandhian.
Apart from Nitish’s core backward caste constituency of 32 percent voters, a good section of the upper castes also backed the ruling alliance in the last two elections, thanks to the presence of the BJP in the coalition. Now that the JD(U) is on its own, this support has become suspect. Nitish’s desperate bid to woo Bhumihars and Rajputs with key positions has not helped.
Soon after Brahmeshwar’s death, his son Indubhushan Singh became the president of Akhil Bharatiya Rashtrawadi Kisan Sanghathan, a front organisation of the Ranvir Sena, and charged two JD(U) MLAs with plotting the murder. This June, Singh hosted BJP MLAs on the first death anniversary of his father and vowed to unite Bhumihars against the government.
Meanwhile, the core constituency has also weakened. Like Lalu, Nitish tried his own brand of social engineering by creating two new backward categories — Ati Pichhra and Mahadalits. Offering them sops earned him early dividends until the sheen of his Mahadalit Vikas Yojana wore off due to rampant corruption and shoddy implementation.
Clearly, Nitish is faced with a three-pronged challenge: retaining his waning support base among the mahadalits, holding on to some upper caste vote after parting ways with the BJP and ensuring that the Muslim vote does not swing the RJD way. Of the three, staking claim to the 16 percent Muslim vote seems to be the easiest, particularly since the gravitation of Yadav votes towards the BJP is a distinct possibility.
What can be the potential impact of Sunday’s blasts on these equations? Will Nitish crack down hard if it is indeed Indian Mujahideen’s Darbhanga module at work? Will he be tempted to echo certain Congress loudmouths who were prompt to accuse the BJP of some sort of inside job? Neither. If anything, a communally charged campaign with rhetoric of internal terrorism flying thick will doom Nitish’s already sagging prospects.
Obviously, the JD(U) cannot afford to alienate the minorities by competing with the BJP for the upper caste votes. Not after parting ways with Modi for secularism’s sake. But, given his weakening backward caste base, only Muslim vote will not see Nitish through. He will also need some upper caste support. Achieving that combination is anyway a tough ask; in a communally polarised election, it will be impossible. More than anyone else, it is Nitish the administrator who can help Nitish the politician today.
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