Janata Parivar, a big challenge to BJP in Bihar

Apart from BJP president Amit Shah’s characterisation of the Janata Parivar merger as a “return of the Goonda Raj”, the reunification of socialist forces presents an electoral challenge in Bihar for which the BJP is yet to come up with a tangible alternative.

The present tangibles are mere straws in the wind with speculations about the promotion of Bihar leaders — Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Manoj Sinha — in a possible Cabinet reshuffle.

Bihar polls also give a foothold to the rather unemployed Shahnawaz Hussain to bid for the Minority Affairs portfolio, which may fall vacant if Najma Heptullah is appointed as governor.

However, there is no echo so far in the BJP’s top echelons of Hussain’s repeated claims to “soften” the Muslims in Bihar by his inclusion in the Union Cabinet.

Bihar polls are also the reason being cited for the BJP refraining from issuing a public reprimand to Giriraj Singh, a strong Bhumihar leader with pronounced Hindutva credentials, for his offensive comments on Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

All these moves only build on the BJP’s upper caste vote base while the party is most certainly going to prop up ousted Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi to wean away the Mahadalit Musahars from the socialists’ fold. NDA allies Ram Vilas Paswan and Upendra Kushwaha bringing their support from Dalits and a section of OBCs to this coalition.

Theoretically, what it means is that the social equations on the ground still favour the socialists with Lalu Prasad-led Rashtriya Janata Dal representing a formidable alliance of Muslims and Yadavs and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) essentially representing the Kurmis, other OBCs and Mahadalits apart from Musahars.

Most Bihar BJP leaders tacitly admit that the upcoming Assembly elections in October-November are a “big challenge” for the party.

“I don’t think we will win any of the seats in my parliamentary constituency,” confessed a BJP MP. His reasoning was that besides the social equations favouring the socialists, the BJP also lacks a leader to match Nitish’s credentials.

Nitish’s rating as the preferred candidate to be Chief Minister was as high as 53 per cent even at the time of Manjhi’s rebellion, when most opinion polls blamed him for the chaos in the Assembly.

The BJP is most likely not going to announce a chief ministerial candidate in Bihar because not only does it not have a candidate to match Nitish’s popularity, the projection of any one candidate from among Sushil Modi, Nand Kishore Yadav, Mangal Pandey or even the ageing CP Thakur will further deepen the fissures in the party.

“Let me be very clear — Bihar is a big challenge. We have a good organisation structure and the benefit of Prime Minister’s popularity. Let us hope for the best,” said a Minister from Bihar.

But will the PM’s popularity be enough against a strong and popular regional leader?

The BJP does not seem very certain of the answer.