BJP woos Mahadalits in Bihar, warns voters of 'jungle raj' over Lalu-Nitish combine

Keeping the Bihar Assembly elections in mind slated to be held later this year, the Bharatiya Janata Party today moved towards forging a new social engineering while celebrating Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar’s birth anniversary in the state capital. The party leadership’s decision to include Ambedkar in a single photo frame, appearing in between two of its foremost icons—Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and Deen Dayal Upadhyaya—at ‘Virat Karyakarta Samagam’ in Patna was not just symbolic but contained a larger political message.

The BJP has been strategically working in this direction for quite some time. It was thus no coincidence that this mega booth level workers convention at Gandhi Maidan in Patna was held on 14 April, the 125th birth anniversary of the Father of the Indian Constitution. Ambedkar was paid floral tributes by top BJP leaders including party president Amit Shah and Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh among others. The occasion was a clear indication that the BJP sounded its poll bugle against the JD(U)-RJD and Congress combined.

There is little doubt that the BJP is moving ahead with a plan to snatch the Mahadalit support base from Chief Minister Nitish Kumar as the party is strategically offering its support to former chief minister and Mahadalit leader Jitan Ram Manjhi. The BJP is trying to project Manjhi as a “martyr” to the cause of the Mahadalit and seeking to garner a sympathy wave.

With such political equations at work in poll-bound Bihar, it is hardly surprising that Ambedkar’s birth anniversary suddenly acquired huge political connotations in the state. So much so that the Bihar government with Nitish Kumar at the helm celebrated it a day earlier on 13 April at Sri Krishna Memorial Hall, which is hardly 100 meters away from the venue where BJP held its convention today.

The BJP is well aware of the challenges that Nitish Kumar could offer to them. Firstly, his perceived image of a good administrator and secondly, an expected merger of his party JD(U) with Lalu Prasad’s RJD, which could broaden his social support base. Realising the two-front obstacle ahead, the BJP is thus shaping up its strategy accordingly.

From Giriraj Singh, Syed Shahnawaz Hussain, Rajiv Pratap Rudi, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Mangal Pandey, Nand Kisore Yadav, Sushil Modi to Amit Shah today barraged the Nitish Kumar government over its performance, particularly for the period when the JD(U) is ruling alone after severed ties with the BJP.

“Jungle raj is back in Bihar. It is the bounded duty of every BJP worker to throw this regime out and usher into a new political era in the state,” Shah said. He was clearly playing on the fear psychosis of the upper caste and also of those social groups, caste and communities who dreaded the 15-year-long RJD rule under Lalu and Rabri Devi.

Since 2005, when JD(U)-BJP combine ousted RJD from the seat of power, the political narrative in Bihar had changed. From an intensely caste and community based politics it took a tilt towards development and governance. There are many who see the proposed merger of JD(U)-RJD as nothing but a casteist coalition and as the return of the same identity politics, which was discarded about a year ago by the people during the Lok Sabha polls. The BJP’s success would largely depend on in wider propagation of this belief.

The message that the BJP wishes to underline is that the party acted as a power pack for Nitish to deliver popular goods. Without BJP, though by his own choice and guided by “his overarching prime ministerial ambitions”, the chief minister is nothing but like a wasted missile.

“The good governance plank became a casualty the day Nitish Kumar broke his long-standing coalition with BJP. About 90 percent of his time and energy goes in managing majority for his government and deliberating on merger with Lalu’s RJD. Can Nitish cite a single developmental work that he initiated in the last 23 months, since the time he separated from the BJP? Whatever achievements that he boasts about now dates back to the BJP-JD(U) coalition government. He is now in the company of Lalu Prasad and Shahabuddin (dreaded don-turned-RJD leader from Siwan). What credentials he now has to talk about governance? People are smart enough to see through his designs,” said former Bihar deputy chief minister and BJP leader Sushil Modi. He then rolled out a list of governmental inaction and financial impropriety.

Shah’s speech as usual was intended to put BJP workers on an aggressive pitch vis-à-vis Nitish-Lalu combine. “I want to tell Lalu that your alliance with JD(U) will yield zero results. Zero plus zero would be zero, no matter how hard you try,” the BJP president said. He also tried to give a spin to a political speculation. “It’s not clear who would be leader of the new JD(U)-RJD coalition. Whether it would be Nitish Kumar or it would be Rabri Devi. They can fight it out after elections,” Shah said.

Bihar is a high stake election for both the BJP and its political rivals. After the kind of popular verdict Delhi delivered in February, Bihar elections have assumed additional political significance. Besides the fact that who wins and who looses, or who gets to rule Bihar, the verdict would also be taken as a pointer to Modi’s charisma – has it waned or continues to hold ground. The BJP would test the might of an united opposition and thus implications of the results could impact the national political scene.

The BJP is taking no chances and has started its campaign early. Already many messages and videos of Nitish-Lalu sound bites spewing venom against each other are floating on WhatsApp and on other social media platforms. The BJP supporters have become very active on this count.

Shah would stay in Patna for one more day. After formally launching the poll campaign, he is holding a series of strategy meetings with his party leaders. Shah and his party men hope people would go by their slogan “Jai Jai Bihar, Bhajpa (BJP) Sarkar”.