"Script was written earlier": Congress MP Sukhdeo Bhagat on Jagdeep Dhankar's "unexpected" resignation
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Congress leader Sukhdeo Bhagat on Tuesday suggested that Vice President Jagdeep Dhankar's resignation might have been preplanned, citing the "disappearance" of Union Minister JP Nadda and Kiren Rijiju from the Business Advisory Committee (BAC) meeting held earlier on Monday.While praying for Dhankar's good health, the Congress MP also mentioned that the Vice President's resignation was "sudden" and "unexpected," saying that if Dhankar stepped down due to health reasons, then he could have done it before the commencement of the Parliament monsoon session "We pray to God for his good health and long life. Everything appears normal in politics, but this is not the case. If it was on health grounds, I think he could have done it even before the session. Yesterday he suddenly resigned, it was unexpected. The BJP has forgotten their government traditions. Union Minister JP Nadda said whatever I say will go on record, so will you dictate to the Vice President? Secondly, there was a meeting of the Business Advisory Committee yesterday," Bhagat told here.Talking about the absence of Nadda and Rijiju from the BAC meeting, the Congress leader added, "The Parliamentary Affairs Minister disappears. JP Nadda disappears. That's why I said the script was written earlier, and that was seen yesterday (July 21)."Meanwhile, Communist Party of India leader Sandosh Kumar also said that only the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) can explain the unexpected resignation of Dhankar. Kumar said that Dhankar seemed really enthusiastic in running the House, and was going to be part of several meetings too."I don't think it is because of his ill health, and only the BJP can explain on what happened last night. The Chairman was very enthusiastic in running the House, there were a number of meeting announced, BAC, all party meeting then quite unexpectedly this happened. We don't know much about this, like all NDA regime decisions, like notebandi, GST were announced midnight only. So this only BJP can explain as he is the creation of BJP that way," he told ANI.Congress leader Jairam Ramesh, too, on Tuesday questioned the resignation of Dhankar, saying that there are "far deeper reasons" behind the resignation, citing the "deliberate" absence of Nadda and Rijiju from the BAC meeting."At 4:30 PM, the BAC reassembled under the chairmanship of Shri Jagdeep Dhankar. It waited for Shri Nadda and Shri Rijiju to arrive. They never came. Shri Jagdeep Dhankar was not personally informed that the two senior Ministers were not attending. Rightly, he took umbrage and rescheduled the BAC for today (July 22) at 1 PM," the Congress leader said in the post.On Monday evening, Dhankhar resigned from his post "to prioritise health care and abide by medical advice." Dhankhar, who is also Chairman of Rajya Sabha, sent his resignation letter to President Droupadi Murmu."To prioritise health care and abide by medical advice, I hereby resign as the Vice President of India, effective immediately, in accordance with Article 67(a) of the constitution," the letter read."I extend my deepest gratitude to Your Excellency - the Hon'ble President of India for her unwavering support and the soothing wonderful working relationship we maintained during my tenure," the letter added.The Vice President also expressed his deep gratitude to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Council of Ministers.
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What is going to happen to Bihar and the rights of people who do not have property and documents? The Election Commission calls it a Special Intensive Revision. The people of Bihar call it Vote Bandi, like demonetisation. I find this a surgically invasive reconstruction. This is not intensive; this is completely invasive and it's not revising; this is complete reconstruction of the electoral roll. Disenfranchisement is a real threat for the poor, migrant workers, and people who don't have enough documents. Underdeveloped is also under-documented. Bihar is a backward State in terms of socio-economic development, so it's also backward in terms of digitalisation and digital documentation. But Bihar is one State where people really love their democracy. They need this democracy. I vividly remember the 1989 election, when for the first time, people managed to confront booth-capturing, they managed to fight this feudal stranglehold over the electoral process, cast their own votes, paying a heavy price. On the day of polling, just after polling was over, some 22 people were gunned down in an electoral massacre simply because people had dared to cast their vote for their own representative. We had won that election. So people know the value of a vote. They are not going to sacrifice it easily. Also Read | SIR in Bihar: Is it time for the opposition to boycott elections? Bihar is the only State in the Hindi belt where the BJP has not directly come into power. Data shows richer, more landed, privileged caste people are more likely to vote BJP, whereas poorer people are less likely. Could this be part of that or just a bureaucratic exercise? The Chief Election Commissioner told us when we met him that a lot of questions came up in Maharashtra, and that's why we're doing this. So I told him that Maharashtra questions will have to be answered in Maharashtra. You can't balance Maharashtra with Bihar. I don't think this is just for one election. This is something all-India—the Election Commission has said this is a new kind of way elections will be conducted in India, how electoral rolls will be constructed, and they are beginning with Bihar because this is the only election happening now. I don't think this is just to win one single Bihar election because the BJP has anyway been in power. It's a double engine government. I don't think it is just their desperation to somehow grab power in Bihar that they are doing the SIR. It goes way beyond that. You rightly said this is a democracy being redesigned in India. If you look at these three things: first, the way Election Commissioners are being chosen. This is the first Election Commission appointed after the Modi government came up with legislation, which clearly says in the three-member committee, the government will have a two-thirds majority. Right now we have Modi and Amit Shah who choose their Election Commissioners. Then you have this whole push for 'One Nation, One Election'. And the third thing is the electoral roll, which is the most crucial thing because if you want universal adult franchise, that has to begin with the construction of the electoral roll. In the 1980s, people used to have their names on electoral rolls, but they couldn't cast their votes due to booth capturing. But they didn't have this existential crisis that their names would not be there. Now they are having this crisis where their names will be removed. This is probably the biggest possible attack on the Constitution. This has brought it to every home. The most fundamental right, the crucial cornerstone of our Constitution, which is universal adult franchise, is at stake. When you are talking about 'one nation, one election', you see a complete redesign that gets into federal powers, disenfranchisement, and takes away powers of States. How much can the Left today actually take on the Right? Bihar is not amused. Bihar is not going to take it lightly. Bihar is one State where even before the Emergency, the 1974 movement happened. When the Emergency really happened, in 1977, while it was still under way, elections happened, and people threw that government out of power. Bihar was one State where probably the Congress got zero seats. Bihar is all about migration, migrant workers. From the colonial period, the indentured labourers were all mostly from Bihar. Migrant labourers from Bihar are all over India. During the Corona [COVID-19] lockdown, Bihar migrant workers had to take the brunt of the whole attack. They had to walk back home on foot. And now they are being removed from the electoral roll. This is going to affect not just migrant workers because their families are there. They are the soul of Bihar. Look at what this SIR tells you: post-2003, that is a new generation. People below 40 will have to prove their citizenship. This is all about proving your citizenship, even though the Election Commission doesn't admit it—they call it only eligibility testing, but they are actually getting into the National Register of Citizens [NRC] thing in Bihar. The young generation below 40, the women of Bihar, migrant workers, and Muslims—they are going to have to prove their citizenship. So I'm sure people will fight back. This fight gives the Left energy. Struggle is the mode of existence for democracy, for the people in Bihar. In the last Assembly election, you won 12 of 19 seats in alliance with the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Congress. In areas where you won, the BJP often lost out to you. Since then, equations are different—Nitish Kumar is ailing, Lalu Yadav is ailing, Chirag Paswan has entered. What do you anticipate? South Bihar is the region where we did our best. And the BJP fared worst in south Bihar. Look at the Lok Sabha results. There are four seats from Shahabad. All four have been won—two by our party, one by the Congress, one by the RJD. And neighbouring three seats in the Magadh region. So of the 10 seats won by the INDIA bloc, seven are from south Bihar, which is Shahabad and Magadh. You can see the BJP paying a lot of attention. Modi's second rally was in Bihar, probably the first time Prime Minister came to Bihar. After that, there was a rally by Chirag Paswan in Ara, which was basically pan-south Bihar mobilisation. He said that I'm going to contest 243 seats and there are talks that he may well be the NDA [National Democratic Alliance] candidate for Chief Minister. But you do not think they're going to dump Nitish Kumar, even though his popularity has declined, he is ailing, and there has been loss of control over law and order? It's a reign of terror now in Bihar. It's a government of the criminals, by the criminals, for the criminals. If you have seen that CCTV footage, that murder in Paras hospital. The way those five young people came, carried out the shooting, and left. None tried to hide their face. It shows a complete lack of fear because they know they enjoy absolute impunity and patronage. Nitish Kumar's main plank was Sushasan, good governance. If this is good governance where criminals call all the shots, I think they have just lost it. But the BJP still needs Nitish Kumar. Without Nitish Kumar, Modi 3.0 would not have happened. That's why he had to be hijacked just before the elections. Even now, if you compare Odisha and Bihar—in Odisha, it was all about Naveen Patnaik's health, Modi was so worried. And here everybody perceives that last one and a half years, Nitish Kumar's health, his public conduct, it is no longer like Nitish Kumar. So definitely something is wrong, but nobody will talk about it, especially in the NDA. Probably, they need Nitish Kumar for the time being and for the elections. But people know that something else is cooking. What about the gathbandhan (opposition) led by the RJD with Tejashwi Yadav, the Congress, and you? Intriguingly, Rahul Gandhi made a statement in Kerala equating the Left with RSS. I won't call it equated, but somehow he has found a way of clubbing the two together, which is completely unwarranted. Quite unfortunate. Given India's diverse political geography, you'll find States where there will not be a completely unified INDIA coalition. The INDIA coalition is basically the coming together of all the major political streams of India's freedom movement. We are the successors of Bhagat Singh. The Indian Left movement is nothing else. Bhagat Singh was probably the first authentic Left leader of India. So the Bhagat Singh legacy, Ambedkar's legacy, the legacy of Gandhi and Nehru, the legacy of Periyar—all these legacies, which are part of the freedom movement, we have to come together to fight this one force, which was never part of the Indian freedom movement, who acted against the freedom movement. There may be differences. You will find Bengal where the Congress and the Left are in opposition. You will find Kerala, where the Left is in power, the Congress in opposition. For me, all non-BJP forces should also be anti-BJP forces because the BJP appropriates everybody. Non-BJP parties—it's not enough to be non-BJP. You have to fight against the BJP. In the INDIA coalition, we have decided to march together and strike together. Structurally, Booth Level Officers (BLOs) are temporary government servants, and Booth Level Agents (BLAs) are always RSS workers. How does the RJD, the Congress, CPI(M-L)L fight against the largest cadre organisation in the world? I'll tell you two things. One, there is this whole talk about Bangladeshis and people from Myanmar and Nepal, BLOs on house visits discovering such things. But on July 10, 2019, when Ravi Shankar Prasad was Law and Justice Minister, he told Parliament, citing the Election Commission, that 2016 to 2019, it got only three complaints from across India of foreign nationals on electoral rolls. Those three cases were in 2018—one from Telangana, one from West Bengal, one from Gujarat, none from Bihar. So this sudden discovery of influx of foreign nationals in Bihar villages defies credibility. Number two, they are introducing NRC by the back door. On February 25, 2020, the Bihar Assembly took a consensus resolution, unanimous resolution—Nitish Kumar was then with the BJP—that Bihar doesn't need NRC. There will never be an NRC in Bihar. Now they are trying to introduce NRC in Bihar through this electoral roll route. People in Bihar are not going to accept this. The BLOs and BLAs are under pressure. When BLOs are seen as instruments of exclusion, they will have to face the people. If they just act as instruments of disenfranchisement, people are not going to accept it. What has been the arc of your 40 years working in Bihar? How do you adapt when the world has shifted from feudalism and land to social media and money? When we started, the key issues in the 1970s were three: land, wages, and dignity. Dignity was probably the most important thing—whether somebody can sit on a cot, ask for wages for work done. Then gradually in the 1980s, we fought for voting rights. Now, dignity means that you lead a dignified life where you have your rights—education, health, employment, and secure employment with decent wages. The agenda has become bigger. There has been enrichment. That generation, which had to fight for their right to vote, for basic human rights—this current generation takes things for granted. But they are an aspiring generation. They want education, jobs, decent wages. We see it as a continuum. World has shifted, but at the end of the day, it's still about the people who matter. Especially in Bihar, that's one State where it still pulsates, the life of the people. The BJP is not seen just as a party that practices communalism in Bihar. It's also a party that represents the feudal forces. So the rise of the BJP is being seen as the rise of feudal restoration in Bihar. Also Read | 'People have said: we want our republic': Dipankar The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) won a few seats in Seemanchal and seeks an alliance with the RJD. Your thoughts on the world situation—Gaza genocide, Pahalgam attack? AIMIM is an all-India party. Last election they won five seats, but Lok Sabha they didn't do that well. There is a feeling that concerns of the Muslim community are not being addressed adequately by people who care for Muslim votes, but they should also care for Muslim voters and their concerns. That's where AIMIM entered Bihar after the anti-CAA movement. Pahalgam—it has been more than 90 days now. We still don't know those four or five terrorists who came and did all this. Where are they? The main question was to bring them to justice. The Lieutenant Governor, Manoj Sinha, gives an interview, says this was a major security failure, I take responsibility. I don't know how you take responsibility sitting on the chair. If the government admits this is a security failure, then they should also admit that stripping Kashmir of its statehood was a big mistake. Kashmir has to get its statehood back. This foreign policy isolation—the primary reason is that India has mortgaged its foreign policy to Trump and Netanyahu combined. If you don't have the guts to condemn genocide in no uncertain terms in the United Nations, which most countries in the world are doing, even England and Germany and France, and we abstained—how can we expect that people will be concerned about Pahalgam? That's what has brought us this isolation and complete derailment of Indian foreign policy. It has been a complete betrayal, a complete failure on every field from economy to governance to foreign policy and increasingly India's unity. If you pit one language against another, one religion against another, if you go on dividing the country, the beauty of the national movement was it united India. The Constitution is the basis that can keep India united. This whole last year's experience has made the people of India more experienced. I'm sure with the SIR and all that, the BJP is exposing itself more clearly to more people. The people will definitely give their final verdict. Saba Naqvi is a Delhi-based journalist and author of four books who writes on politics and identity issues.
