Ram Vilas Paswan’s departure from the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in Bihar has opened elections to the state assembly.
Until last week of September, the NDA was regarded as a clear winner and most opinion polls predicted an overwhelming majority for the NDA and a poor second place for Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the Grand Alliance (GA) led by Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), winning less than 100 seats in the 243. member of the Bihar assembly.
That sense seems to have changed with the departure of the LJP, creating the impression that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has no faith in Nitish Kumar, who prior to the 2015 assembly elections left the NDA and joined the Grand Alliance. only to return to the fold in 2017.
Officially, Nitish Kumar is the NDA’s main ministerial candidate, but the LJP’s departure may create the impression that the BJP may have its own CM, if the party wins more seats than the JD (U). The LJP can help the BJP as the party chairman Chirag Paswan has been saying that Bihar needs an alternative to Kumar, who has been the prime minister for the past 15 years.
The only time the LJP participated in assembly elections alone in the last two decades was in 2005. In the February elections of that year, the party contested 178 seats and won 29, with 12.63% of the votes. . A fractured verdict led to another election in October of the same year that the LJP contested 203 seats and obtained 10, with 11.1% of the votes. Since then, the party’s vote share has been declining.
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The BJP believes that its transfer of votes is imperative for the victory of the JD (U) candidates in many upper-caste-dominated seats. In the 2010 assembly election, when the BJP and JD (U) contested together, the JD (U) fought 141 seats and won 115, obtaining 22.61% of the vote. In 2015, when JD (U) was part of the Grand Alliance, he contested 101 seats and won 71 seats, obtaining 17% of the total votes surveyed. The two assembly elections show that JD (U) has done better in the NDA as the BJP votes were transferred.
The LJP’s decision to oppose JD (U) is apparently aimed at preventing the transfer of votes from the BJP. The LJP’s decision to run candidates in the 122 seats that the JD (U) would contest is being seen more as a vote-cutting exercise, in which BJP supporters could opt for LJP, still an ally of the NDA, instead of JD (U). It would be interesting to see who the LJP candidates would be in these seats.
If the plan works, the BJP could emerge as a king maker by winning more seats than JD (U) and thus can wrest the CM job from JD (U), a long-standing wish of the leaders of the BJP status.
Political activists say that the LJP’s departure from the NDA in Bihar is part of a plan to marginalize Nitish Kumar in state politics. “I think that the Chirag Paswan (LJP) revolt is not spontaneous. In some ways, it seems like a sponsored agenda to sideline Kumar. I think this is the game plan, which will hurt the JD (U) and benefit the BJP to further strengthen their position, ”said Patna-based political activist Saibal Gupta.
DM Diwakar, former director of the AN Sinha Institute for Social Studies, said that it appears that the LJP is working in conjunction with the BJP. “If the Dalit vote fragment and the committed support of the BJP go to the LJP, then the JD (U) will find things difficult in those seats, where there is a clear possibility of a triangular contest,” he said.
The irony for Nitish Kumar is that the main opposition to him becoming a CM for the fourth time comes from the BJP and not the AG, which is considered far behind the NDA in the contest, according to different opinion polls published in September.
There is an opinion in a section of the BJP that Nitish Kumar wants to overcome the anti-incumbent factor by taking advantage of the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and become CM again. The BJP may not want to give up the CM position to Kumar so easily this time around and Chirag Paswan would put Kumar’s popularity to the NDA to the test.
The LJP revolt against JD (U) may change the dynamics of pre-election alliances as happened in Maharashtra, where Shiv Sena challenged the 2019 Maharashtra assembly elections in alliance with the BJP, but formed the government with the help from Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party. (NCP).
Although the Shiv Sena resigned claiming that he wanted Uddav Thackeray as prime minister, analysts said the party felt marginalized as the BJP’s share of the vote was increasing and its own declining. In Bihar, Kumar can use a similar reason to leave the NDA and support the Grand Alliance, a possibility in the realm of politics.
Although the Rashtriya Janata Dal, dimly lit in polls without Lalu Prasad’s backroom skills and maneuvering, is suspicious of Nitish Kumar since leaving the GA in 2017, Congress is not. Left-wing parties, which are also part of the Grand Alliance, may be willing to co-opt with Congress to keep the BJP out.
But, everything would depend on the number of seats that individual parties will win in the three-phase elections, the results of which will be announced on November 10. That politics is about achieving the impossible was underlined in Maharashtra and a new political equation emerged in Bihar afterwards on November 10 cannot be ruled out.
(With input from Arun Kumar in Patna)
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