AA Edit | BJP-JDS And The Nitish Factor: Do Bihar Voters Get A Say?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s declaration last week that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will seek a re-election in Bihar under the leadership of Janata dal (United) leader and incumbent chief minister Nitish Kumar has come as a response to the taunt by the Opposition leader Tejashwi Yadav asking who will be the chief ministerial face of the ruling alliance but it also seeks to soothe the frayed nerves within the chief minister’s party and assuage feelings of unease within the alliance.

The BJP and the JD(U) have had an uneasy relationship ever since they formed a government in 2017. Mr Kumar had won the 2015 Assembly on the secular plank along with the RJD but chose to dump its ally, switch sides and remain in power. The knack of the old socialist warhorse to conduct such a clever and smooth operation has been appreciated by all but the BJP has never trusted the leader fully ever since, if reports from the state are an indication. The BJP has always been ready with a plan B in case Mr Kumar chooses to return to his socialist secular moorings. It convinced Mr Kumar this time around that his party has ceased to be the senior partner in the combination and that the saffron party come of age by designing a formula which allotted them both an equal share of seats in the Assembly elections.

Every partner in the alliance of convenience in Bihar needs each other despite the serious differences they have with one another on policies. Mr Kumar and his party share the history of the Indian socialist movement and have been proponents of secularism though they were the first major formation from the anti-Sangh Parivar camp to join it and help the BJP form a government at the Centre in the nineties. The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) of Union minister Chirag Paswan misses no chance to issue a threat to leave the formation, knowing full well that the BJP will not allow him to do so. And the BJP has been allowing its partners to blow off steam on one hand and silently making creeping acquisitions in the vote share on the other. The party is aware that it faces a leadership vacuum in the state now and that it needs its present partners before it can call the shots. It dances to the tune of the allies with a plan which is not to play second fiddle forever.

While the politics of power plays out in India’s most backward state, no one has made a promise to attend to the real issues of the people. It is fashionable for political leaders to promise steps to attract industrial investment but no one talks about committing to investing in the state’s education, healthcare and infrastructure, which is necessary to take Bihar out of the mess it has been ever since Independence. That will call for a drastic change in their agendas but parties have invented easier routes to garner votes. Mr Kumar’s continuance in his post into the 21st year or his departure hardly makes a difference to the lives of the people of Bihar. And that is the saddest story of the state.