After the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s big electoral win in Uttar Pradesh, what's started cooking in Bihar? This question draws substance from a series of recent developments: The merger into the BJP of all the three MLAs of the NDA alliance partner Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP); the open calls being made by the BJP's second and third rung leaders that the time has come for the saffron party to place its own candidate as the chief minister – and the sharp critical reactions of BJP MLAs against Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in relation to his recent and uncharacteristic outburst against Speaker Vijay Kumar Sinha on the floor of the assembly.
Earlier this year, two noteworthy incidents happened. First, the chief minister's long time work companion and then Bihar principal secretary Chanchal Kumar was abruptly transferred to Delhi on a deputation. Second, the news is that Union Minister R C P Singh planned to build a Lord Ram temple in his home district of Nalanda. 'RCP', as he is referred to, has also donated money for the construction of the Ayodhya temple.
With Kumar and the Janata Dal (United) having remained opposed to public shows of Hindu religiosity as a matter of principle, RCP's religious turn is likely to have made the CM uncomfortable. In past months, there have been intense speculations that RCP, a Union Minister from the JD(U) quota, has been moving closer to the BJP camp.
Political talk, meanwhile, has been centred in past days on two possibilities. First, Kumar would be offered an honourable exit from Bihar by way of being chosen as the NDA's choice for the vice president's post that falls vacant later this year. Second, Kumar will move to the Rajya Sabha and subsequently be inducted as a minister in the next round of the Narendra Modi government's cabinet reshuffle. The theory in currency in political circles in Patna these days is this: The state will witness major political upheavals during this year itself.
Compare and contrast
Bihar and UP together comprise almost one-fourth - or 120 of Lok Sabha's 543 seats. With the Yogi Adityanath government firmly in the saddle in UP, a BJP-led government in Bihar can provide the double-barrel advantage to Prime Minister Modi's 2024 Lok Sabha campaign. However, the trouble for the BJP is that Bihar and UP are similar and dissimilar at the same time.
In UP, the BJP has been in power on its own steam on three occasions, but Bihar has remained unconquered territory in that sense. UP and Bihar are alike in terms of human development indices, food habits and socio-cultural norms. But there has remained an essential difference: Unlike today's UP, the socialist movements have continued to grow in Bihar, albeit in pockets such as Gaya, Jahanabad, Purnea, Patna and Begusarai.
The Left parties have continued to have a presence in the Bihar assembly since the 1990s. Even in the current Bihar assembly, the CPM has a strength of 16 members. During the eighties, ultra-left or caste groups had set up private armies going by names such as Lorit Sena, Bhoomi Sena or the Ganga Sena - and several massacres and movements were witnessed. The point of all this: Because of the stronger socialist traditions in Bihar, BJP strategists have seemed a little unsure about the strategies that it should adopt to exercise complete political control of the state.
So near, yet so far
The BJP is best positioned today to go in for the Bihar endgame. Thirty-nine of the state's 40 MPs belong to the NDA, and - following the induction of the three VIP legislators - the BJP has emerged as the single largest party with 77 MLAs - still far from the majority mark of 122 in the state assembly.
The problem is also about the numerical gridlock in the 243 member state assembly. The Rashtriya Janata Dal-led Opposition alliance has good numbers, too: With 110 MLAs. Any possible attempt by the BJP to dislodge Kumar and attempt government formation minus the support of Kumar's JD (U) could lead to a chaotic situation and even turn counterproductive. An amendment to the anti-defection law passed by the earlier Rabri Devi government requires that two-thirds of the existing MLAs of a party need to defect to make the split valid. Therefore, it is improbable that defections from the Opposition alliance in favour of the BJP can or will happen. The BJP's best-case scenario seems to be this: To persuade Kumar to take on a new role as a Union Minister or accept responsibilities that come with ceremonial posts such as that of the country's vice president.
Master of the game
Indeed, Kumar faces a big political crisis today. But this too is true: Each time in the past that his political epitaph has been written, Kumar's responses have taken people by surprise. Kumar's political guile, unpredictability and survival instincts can hardly be underestimated. Given the buoyancy of BJP cadres after the UP win, Kumar's circumstances have turned adverse. But the levers of change remain firmly in his hands.
If pushed further into a corner, Kumar could well feel inclined to explore the option of doing a repeat of the 2015 experiment of aligning with the RJD to keep the BJP out of power. If the situation turns ugly between the BJP and the JD(U), Kumar, as the sitting CM, could even force mid-term elections in the state by recommending the dissolution of the assembly to Governor Phagu Chauhan. The BJP leadership would also not like to force Kumar's hand for another reason: Kumar remains a respected leader with a clean image, whose acceptability cuts across genders and castes, while the BJP has not been able to build up a state leader to match Kumar's status. The question is this: Will Kumar take the bait of accepting a role within the NDA at the Centre?
(Srinand Jha is a senior journalist.)
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