Son Rise: Tejaswi, Chirag, Prashant are Bihar's new flavours as assembly polls may power a generational shift
Nitish Kumar is wobbly. A generation of Biharis has seen no other chief minister. As the 22nd chief minister of Bihar since February 22, 2015, having previously held the office from 2005 to 2014 and for a short period in 2000, he is Bihar's longest-serving chief minister, holding the post for a record ninth term.
Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) super boss and former chief minister Lalu Yadav is a pale shadow of his best. After his October 2013 conviction in the Fodder Scam, he was disqualified from the Lok Sabha and cannot contest elections anymore. In addition, he has health issues.
The third stalwart of this Mandal triumvirate, Ram Vilas Paswan, is no more.
What comes in their place are their scions, in at least two cases. Lalu's son Tejaswi Yadav and NDA minister Chirag Paswan, son of the redoubtable Ram Vilas. Add to it a newbie Prashant Kishor, whose Jan Suraaj Party, may not win elections on its own but has an even more critical role to play – it can cut into the anti-BJP votes with precision.
Not to be underrated is the not-so-young son of Jitan Ram Manjhi, Santosh Suman Manjhi, who at 50 is a sitting MLC and hopes to play the role of a king maker, should the need arise.
Says Ashmita Gupta, member-secretary of the Asian Development Research Institute (ADRI) in Patna: 'There is no doubt that the younger lot of politicians' time has come. Tejaswi Yadav is drawing crowds and has a mase base. Both Prashant Kishor and Chirag Paswan have done their grassroot work. Let's admit that the younger politicians are well tuned into advanced data collection and technology to leave their imprimatur on the forthcoming Bihar assembly elections.'
The other point is the traditional role of caste equations and vote bank numbers, which have dominated elections in Bihar revolving around three main players: the RJD, the BJP, and the Janata Dal (United) or JD(U), each enjoying the support of nearly captive voter bases.
According to the 2020 Bihar Assembly election results, the RJD bagged the largest vote share (23.11 per cent) followed by the BJP in second place (19.46 per cent); the JD(U) (15.39 per cent), Congress (9.48 per cent), and the Left parties (4.64 per cent).
Smaller players like Chirag Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas), or LJP(RV); Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular), or HAM(S); and Mukesh Sahani's Vikassheel Insaan Party, or VIP, also played a role in giving their respective alliances an edge. This time, their edge could be more pronounced.
Notwithstanding the modern tool of political propagation, the young blood must constantly seek out new alliances in a fight, which is expected to go down to the wire.
Tejaswi is trying hard to broaden its Muslim-Yadav vote base by wooing other castes such as the Kushwaha, Dhanuk, and Mallah from the Other Backwards Classes (OBCs) and Extremely Backwards Classes (EBCs).
As part of this strategy, the RJD fielded many candidates from the Kushwaha or Koiri (vegetable growers) caste in the last Lok Sabha election and appointed Mangani Lal Mandal, a senior socialist leader from the EBC Dhanuk caste, as its Bihar party president.
According to the 2023 Bihar caste survey, EBCs make up 36 per cent of the total electorate. The RJD is also counting on the support of its ally the VIP, which has a strong base among the Mallah or Kevat community in constituencies along the Ganges.
The JD (U)-BJP alliance is not too badly placed either. In the 2020 assembly election, the JD(U) contested 115 seats but won only 43, while the BJP won 74 out of the 110 seats it contested. The partners flipped their positions within the alliance, with the BJP emerging as the senior partner after playing a supportive role to Nitish Kumar for nearly four decades. The BJP conceded the chief minister's post to Kumar to avoid any potential blowback from the influential EBC castes. 2025 promises to be no different.
To broaden its voter base, the Congress – in wilderness since 1989 - has appointed Rajesh Kumar, a member of the Ravidas caste (Jatavs) as its Bihar unit chief.
Says political analyst and former principal of Patna College, NK Chaudhary: "Just age is no criteria for winnability in Bihar or else JP and Karpoori Thakur would not have made an impact. Social alliances are all about caste. Whatever you do, elections in Bihar ultimately boil down to caste. Nitish has to be the face of the NDA despite the talk about his declining health as his support base is still intact.''
This is not to suggest that development is not an issue, Chaudhary says. Nitish Kumar has gained considerable goodwill among women voters thanks to prohibition and schemes like free cycles for schoolgirls, something that the BJP is keen to cash in on, because after the death of Sushil Modi, they don't have a state-level leader of any standing.
There is no doubt that the younger lot of politicians' time has come.
Ironically, Nitish Kumar's son Nishant Kumar, has been left behind in the sweepstakes.
In a poll, which is heating up as D-Day approaches, modernity and feudalism mix and match beautifully in Bihar.
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