Parties see opportunity in Dalit assertion in Bihar

Lok Janshakti Party president Chirag Paswan has been attacking the Bihar government and chief minister Nitish Kumar over governance and management of migrant crisis and the pandemic

Dalit leaders have been hogging the limelight in poll-bound Bihar as the state gears for assembly elections scheduled in October-November. Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) president Chirag Paswan has been attacking the Bihar government and chief minister Nitish Kumar over governance and management of migrant crisis and Covid-19 pandemic. Paswan has been upset over Janata Dal-United (JDU)’s reluctance in accommodating LJP in the 12 nominations to the Bihar Legislative Council from the governor’s quota even as the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) wanted to give it one seat. The result has been the nominations still remain stuck.

Chirag Paswan has been upset over Janata Dal-United’s reluctance in accommodating LJP in the 12 nominations to the Bihar Legislative Council from the governor’s quota . (PTI)

JD-U has maintained it does not have an alliance with LJP in the state and has become friendlier with former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi as it seeks to have a Dalit leader by its side to offset possible exit of Chirag Paswan’s party from the ruling National Democratic Alliance.

Former Bihar minister Shyam Razak this month defected to Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) saying 99% of the leaders in JD-U were upset with the Kumar but did not have a voice. “I cannot stay in a party where social justice is stripped,” he said.

BJP’s Dalit leader, Sanjay Paswan, a former union minister, has asked Kumar to vacate his post for someone else after having served for 15 years. This also antagonized the JD-U, but Paswan termed it his personal opinion.

Sanjay Paswan said his attacks on Kumar were a kind of manifestation of the Dalit assertion. “Why only Chirag, even Shyam Razak’s move to resign as minister and assembly member... is a sign of growing Dalit assertion and there is nothing surprising in Dalit politics gaining momentum as it is a natural process.”

Sanjay Paswan, who is a legislative council member, said the first phase of state politics was dominated by the forward castes, then came backward classes and now it was the turn of Dalits and extremely backward classes. “Earlier also Bihar saw the emergence of Dalit leaders like Bhola Paswan Shastri, Karpoori Thakur, and Ram Sunder Das... Now, Dalit politics is becoming stable and self-reliant.”

Sanjay Paswan said that Dalit leaders would have to make sacrifices and refrain from blackmailing for petty gains. “They should not get carried away by the lure of identity politics as it will render them ineffective and defeat the larger goal.”

DM Diwakar, a former director of Patna’s AN Sinha Institute of Social Studies, said with over 18% of Bihar’s population, Dalits are a potent force that none of the political parties wants to antagonize. “In the past, Dalits identified with the Left parties and then with the Congress, but gradually they too drifted towards liberal parties once the Left weakened. ...Dalits [in the 1990s] found in Lalu Prasad [Yadav of RJD] a saviour and along with Muslims formed a potent force. Today all the parties have their Dalit morcha to take advantage of identity politics among Dalits and that is the reason quite a few leaders have emerged and are in demand by one party or the other to counter one another.”