Nitish Kumar in pole position

Nitish Kumar’s development agenda seems to have brought Bihar back on track. Will the wily Lalu Prasad prove the poll pundits wrong, or will Ram Vilas Paswan play the role of king maker? Saswat Panigrahi examines the strengths and weaknesses of the title contenders

Steering a new social engineering

“Bihar ki gaadi patri se utar chuki hai. Usko patri par lana hoga” (The train of Bihar has derailed. It needs to be brought back onto the track.)

Those were the words of Nitish Kumar in response to a huge public mandate in support of JD(U)-BJP coalition before five years. That time he had the unenviable task of reviving a topsy-turvy Bihar.

The development indicators painted a bleak picture. Data of 2004-05 showed 41.4 per cent of Bihar’s population was below the poverty line. A staggering 53 per cent of State’s population was illiterate -- just double the national average -- the highest rate of illiteracy in the country. Bihar had a per capita income of Rs 7,443 -- the lowest in the country -- a one-third of the national average. The State was languishing in the bottom echelons of the national development index.

Bihar was making headlines for all the wrong reasons- its poor infrastructure, low delivery of services and large scale scams. Crime, ignorance and anarchy were the key features of a paralysed Bihar. The State was utterly failing to utilise central funds.

Five years have passed since Nitish Kumar took the reins of Bihar. Showcasing a new miracle economy the State has changed fast. The State registered a high growth rate for the first time in the post-Independence period. According to the Bihar Economic Survey 2009-10 State’s economy registered an impressive annual growth rate of 11.35 per cent over a five-year from 2004-05 to 2008-09. This is in sharp contrast to a mere 3.5 per cent growth rate in the previous five years. The survey also shows a rise in per capita income from Rs 7,443 in 2004 to Rs.13,959 in 2009. Now Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has earned the right to flay the Congress-led Central Government’s for its apathy in granting funds for Bihar’s development.

The sea change vindicates Nitish Kumar's claims of a naya Bihar (a new Bihar) in which his coalition partner BJP has an equal share. Under the leadership of Nitish Kumar and Sushil Modi, the JD(U)-BJP coalition has successfully shaped Bihar’s social engineering. The coalition is again headed to the polls where Bihar’s electorate will give their verdict.

Before taking over the reins of the State, Nitish Kumar had a successful stint as a Union Minister for Railways and Agriculture during the NDA regime. Kumar, a mechanical engineer, is a product of the Sampoorna Kranti movement launched by legendary Jayaprakash Narayan.

If election is the index of performance and popularity, then the JD(U)-BJP coalition seems poised to storm back to power.

On a comeback trail?

"Jab tak samosa me aalu, tab tak Bihar me Lalu (As long as there is potato in the samosa, Bihar will always have its Lalu)", once proclaimed Lalu Prasad Yadav that became a smash hit over night. Hate him, love him, but you just can’t ignore him. That aptly sums up the enigma that is Lalu Prasad.

Political observers have marvelled at his mastery over playing with the complex permutation and combination of caste, class and religious equations in politics. His ‘Lantern age’ was fuelled by blatant use of caste and communal politics, often camouflaged under dubious slogans in the garb of ‘social justice’ and ‘secularism’.

A product of the Sampoorna Kranti movement launched by legendary Jayaprakash Narayan -- as his rival Nitish Kumar and his foe-turned-friend Ram Vilas Paswan -- Lalu Prasad positioned himself as a messiah of Dalits and minorities. He successfully nurtured the Muslim, Yadav and Dalit (MYD) combine at different periods of his political reign.

Lalu stoked the Mandal fire and rode to the crest of Patna’s power centre, to head a Janata Dal government in 1990. Five years later in 1995 Assembly elections he made a clean sweep by winning a staggering 165 of the 324 assembly seats. But a year later, Lalu was embroiled in the chara ghotala (fodder scam) estimated at Rs 950 crore. The Janata Dal was divided, and Lalu formed his own party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal by virtually taking with him all the Janata Dal legislators in the Bihar assembly. The opposition knives were out for a cornered Lalu resulting in him relinquishing his chief ministership. In a political masterstroke, he anointed his wife Rabri Devi as CM.

Lalu spent 103 days in custody. From the ‘comfort zone’ of the jail he remote controlled the functioning of Patna darbar. It was during those days the state’s crime graph witnessed a steep rise. Crime suddenly became a lucrative career option in Lalu’s Bihar, and kidnapping became an ‘organised industry’.

It was during the Lalu era that Bihar’s development graph dipped alarmingly. In those days the State utterly failed to utilise central funds. Bihar witnessed a zero growth in his fifteen year legacy. Bihar was at the crossroads. But Lalu managed to hog headlines by promising to make the roads of the state ‘as smooth as Hema Malini's cheeks’.

When the Congress-led UPA government came to power in 2004, Lalu Prasad got the lucrative Union Ministry for Railways though he was eyeing the Home Ministry. Reports suggest that Prasad had misused his position as the Union Railway Minister to help his relatives acquire land. As the Railway Minister he appointed Justice UC Banerjee Commission to ‘investigate’ the Godhra train carnage. Banerjee commission came out with a report in 2005 just before the last Bihar election. “The Sabarmati Express burning was an accident,” the report said. The politically motivated report was to score brownie points with Lalu’s minority voters. But in the 2005 Bihar elections his lamp lighter era flickered.

After UPA-II came to power in 2009 Congress derailed Lalu from the cabinet. Lalu suddenly finds himself out in the cold and politically isolated. The maverick politician is making a desperate bid to reclaim lost ground. But the ghosts of the past still haunt him.

Political opportunist par excellence

He wears different hats, he changes his friends with even greater alacrity. A firm believer in the dictum -- there are no permanent friends or enemies in politics there is only permanent interest.

You have seen him in the United Front camp. He was there in National Democratic Alliance. You have seen him in United Progressive Alliance. You have also seen him in Fourth Front camp. He has served as Union Minister under as many as five different Prime Ministers. He could emerge as a possible king maker in case of a fractured mandate. Meet the Lok Janshakti Party supremo Ram Vilas Paswan, a man for all seasons, and opportunistic ally.

A product of Sampoorna Kranti movement launched by legendary Jayaprakash Narayan -- as his rival Nitish Kumar and his foe-turned-friend Lalu Prasad Yadav -- Paswan also stakes his claim as a messiah of Dalits and minorities.

Paswan who started his political career under the aegis of the United Socialist Party later joined the Janata Dal. When the Janata Dal was split, Paswan jumped to Janata Dal (United). In 2000 Paswan then broke away from the Janata Dal (United) and formed the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP).

Paswan served in lucrative portfolios of Railways, Communications, Coal and mines, Chemicals and Fertilizers and Steel, Labour and Welfare in the Union Cabinet. But his
Stints in the cabinet meant precious little for Bihar.

In the 2005 Bihar elections Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) performed poorly. In the 2009 general election Paswan forged an alliance with Lalu Prasad whom he once accused of being extremely corrupt. The foes-turn-friends duo formed Fourth front dumping their erstwhile coalition partner UPA. LJP drew a blank in the 15th Lok Sabha. But a shameless Paswan rushed to New Delhi to provide what he described as ‘moral support’ to UPA.

Paswan, like his new found friend Lalu languishes in political oblivion. He is desperately eyeing plum ministeries in the hope that the LJP-RJD combine might prove political pundits wrong and upset Nitish Kumar’s applecart.