Nitish Kumar’s anti-BJP stunts to woo Muslim & Dalit votes may backfire in Bihar
In “Hindu India”, everything is caste-based. Since politics is the essence of public life, everything under the election-based politics is also determined by caste.
Did we not say that Caste is the life-breath of India? Read our book, Caste — A Nation Within the Nation, (Books for Change, 2002, Bangalore. For copies of the English, Hindi and Kannada version write to DV office. Rs. 140 each).
The tiny Kurmi jati OBC leader, Nitish Kumar, has been getting raving reviews in even foreign media about his “great development” efforts — of course after he buttered the Brahmins who started loving the OBC leader only after joining hands with their own Brahmana Jati Party (BJP).
Heartland of Budhism: But false media reports painting a rosy picture will not please the oppressed 90% of Bihar — perhaps the country’s most backward state.
Once the heartland of Budhism, the ruthless upper castes crushed the backbone of the SC/ST/BCs for having fought Budhism. But after they failed to save Budhism, they enbloc became Muslims to continue their fight. The fight is continuing because the war against Brahminism is never ending.
The latest game played by Nitish Kumar is to woo the state’s massive 17% Muslim who have totally deserted him.
Lalu cheats Bahujans: The oppressed Bahujans of Bihar once found a liberator in Lalu Prasad Yadav. We too met him in Patna, when as Chief Minister he was thrown into jail, to offer our support. But once the Yadav leader started flirting with the serpent, the oppressed Bahujans deserted him and he fell from grace.
Bihar continues to be one of the poorest states of India but blessed with a fertile soil, plentiful Ganga water, and every input. But Biharis are today fleeing to Calcutta, Bombay and lately Bangalore. A micro-minority of upper castes — Brahmins, Thakurs, Bhumihars — are ruthlessly ruling Bihar. Strangely, Baniyas in Bihar are backward.
Narendra Modi a liability: Narendra Modi, Gujarat Chief Minister, whose visit to Bihar provoked the current Bihar turmoil. Modi a Ganchi, an oil-crushing OBC fellow, is a liability to the party itself outside Gujarat. The Teli with hardly any caste strength did a magic in Gujart by hinduising (enslaving) Dalits and Triblas and using them to kill Muslims in the famous Gujarat Genocide -2002. With the solid support of the Dalits and Tribals, he crushed Muslims to please the Gujarat’s powerful ruling castes — Brahmins, Banias and Patels — whom he made powerless. But this caste experiment cannot be launched in Bihar.
The Brahminical upper castes are using Nitish to outwit the populous Muslims and Yadavas but he cannot conduct this experiment as his own caste is a poor minority. Brahminical media gave him a big media build-up but one single rain washed out all the paint on his face.
Irshadul Haque adds from Patna: The present political game, being played by Nitish Kumar (Kurmi) and his political ally, the BJP, is nothing but a pressure tactic. After four and half years in power, Nitish is now thinking that he is the champion of Bihar politics and that only he can mobilize the masses. The “political turmoil” created by him is a part of his game plan. After the swabhiman rally of BJP in Patna, Nitish successfully tarnished BJP. He said BJP tried to malign his “secular figure” by publishing a photograph of Nitish holding his hand with Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in local dailies. Consequently he also returned Rs. 5 crore, the aid given by the Modi Govt. during Kosi flood in Bihar in 2008. In fact, these are part of a game being played by JDU and BJP before the forthcoming assembly election in Oct.-Nov.2010.
Wooing Muslims: Nitish thinks this game can target both Lalu Prasad as well as the BJP. By returning the money to Narendra Modi and asking him not to come to Bihar for election campaign, Nitish wants to woo the 17% (1.4 crores) Muslims of Bihar. If the Muslims are polarized against Lalu then not only his party will enjoy Muslim support but also can get full majority. There are at least 60 out of the 243 Assembly seats where Muslims are dominant in Bihar. Secondly, he is also trying to put pressure on BJP that he can take credit for proving Narendra Modi as the Muslim Enemy No.1 as Lalu did it earlier by arresting L.K. Advani for his rath yatra (1990-91). After arresting Advani, Lalu got full support of Muslims.
Pasmanda gains upper hand: But it must be remembered that the year 2010 is not 1990. After 20 years political situation has changed. Now the Pasmanda Muslim movement has emerged as a major force in Bihar. Pasmanda Muslims are able to understand that “communalism” is not an issue on which they can be fooled. They know that (1) employment and (2) education are the main concern of Muslims. So Nitish is day -dreaming for his vote in the name of Narendra Modi.
Caste-based politics in Bihar has been a major factor in election. Nitish is a Kurmi which is only 3% of the population while Yadavs are 12%.
Upper caste revolt: In such a situation Nitish cannot do any magic in Bihar unless he gets support of the upper castes. But here also Nitish faces a revolt by two major upper castes. Bhumihar (3%) and Rajput also about 3% are against Nitish. His party state president, Lalan Singh, a Bhumihar leader, resigned from the party post and started Kisan Mahapanchayat against Nitish. Digvijay Singh, a Rajput and rebel JDU leader, successfully contested a parliamentary election as an independent and against Nitish. And the third dominant caste leader, Prabhunath Singh, also an MP, went against Nitish, At least six JD(U) MLAs joined Prabhunath Singh, a dominant muscleman of the Rajput caste.
Anti-Lalu wave: Only the 2.5% Brahmins have not taken their sword openly against him. But generally Brahmins have never been directly associated with the JDU. They have been the supporters of either BJP or the Congress. Nitish media management has been very strong. With Bhumihars against him, he might now lose the support of Bhumihar-dominated media.
Maha Dalit Commission: Nitish has never enjoyed the full support of any caste. He was riding on the anti-Lalu Yadav wave.
However, he has been trying to divide the Dalit votes. The 15% Dalit votes have been with Lalu and Ram Vilas (LJP), to some extent with the BSP and left wing local parties. But over the past four years, Nitish, by creating the “Maha Dalit Commission”, has tried to polarize Dalit vote minus Paswan and Chamar castes. These two castes have almost 65% votes of total Dalit votes.
But it is too early to say that “Maha Dalits” will support him. This time, neither Lalu nor Ram Vilas are going to commit the same mistake as they did in 2005. In 2005 Assembly election, Lalu and Ram Vilas contested separately. But now at least Lalu has given this message by sending Ram Vilas Paswan to the Rajya Sabha that they are going to contest together. And hence this time Nitish will see rough weather in assembly election
0 comments:
Post a Comment