Caste survey findings: JD-U advises party leaders, allies against public criticism
A few legislators from the ruling alliance have questioned findings of the statewide caste survey, which were released on October 2, and demanded a fresh survey.
The Janata Dal United on Monday said constituents of the ruling alliance Mahagathbandhan should raise their grievances, if any, with the findings of the caste survey at a proper forum.
“The grievances from within the alliance should be given/raised at proper forum provided they are not politically motivated. The CM has assured to look into their grievances,” said JD (U) principal spokesperson K C Tyagi.
A few legislators from the ruling alliance have questioned findings of the statewide caste survey, which were released on October 2, and demanded a fresh survey.
One of them, RJD legislator Rambali Chandravanshi, said on Monday, “The survey lacks transparency. A survey conducted by A N Sinha Institute of Social Studies at the behest of state government in 2013 had showed the population of Chandravanshis at 30.32 lakh whereas it has come down to 21 lakh in the caste survey. There is something wrong. I request ward-wise counting afresh,” Chandravanshi, an MLC, told reporters.
The Chandravanshi community comprises subcastes like Bind, Beldar, Nonia, Kahar and Kumhar.
BJP MLC Pramod Chandravanshi staged a sit-in, demanding re-evaluation of numbers of different castes as the “whole exercise has turned out to be a big scam.”
“The entire survey is a big fraud. A deliberate attempt has been made to increase the number of ‘government castes’ (M-Y) while communities like Bind, Beldar, Nonia, Kahar, Kumhar, etc., to name a few, have been shown less in numbers,” said the BJP legislator.
Rashtriya Lok Janata Dal (RLJD) president Upendra Kushwaha, a former union minister, called the survey report “entirely fabricated” and announced to stage a protest on October 11 in all district headquarters in the state and a march outside Raj Bhawan in Patna on October 14.
“We will raise our voice against this fake data,” he told reporters. “We feel the government released the data in haste keeping in view the upcoming elections...The focus was only on elections and political gains, and not the benefit of the people,” said Kushwaha, who was till recently in chief minister Nitish Kumar’s JD-U.
JD (U) MP from Sitamarhi, Sunil Singh Pintu, said it has been decided to hold a counting of Teli (oil makers) community on its own in the entire state.
Lalu slams critics
Meanwhile, RJD president Lalu Prasad charged critics of caste census with being against the humanistic principles of social, economic and political equality and proportionate representation. The former chief minister of Bihar, one of the tallest leaders to have emerged from the Mandal wave of 1990s, made the declamation in a social media post in Hindi.
Prasad claimed that those opposed to it “do not have an iota of a sense of justice” and “wish to maintain their caste supremacy, from birth till death, by eating into the rights of others”.
He added, cryptically, “Cancer cannot be treated with a pill meant for a headache”.