Though Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Union Home Minister Amit Shah has made it amply clear thatthe doors have been shut for Nitish Kumar, there is no dearth of political observers who are of theview that the Narendra Modi government is using the central agencies against favourite whipping boyRJD chief Lalu Prasad and his family members to put pressure on Bihar chief minister to return to theNational Democratic Alliance (NDA) fold.
Speculations are rife that the Janata Dal (United) supremo is thinking in terms of making anotherhomecoming. But the party sources stoutly deny any such possibility and claim that the Grand Allianceis becoming more and more stronger.
Notwithstanding the rumours, the fact is that Nitish Kumar is in no way going to return to BharatiyaJanata Party again. The reason is simple: After the 2020 Assembly election, in which Janata Dal(United) could win only 43 seats against the saffron partner 74, he has come to realise that the BJPis, in a planned way, weakening him and systematically destroying his party.
Though immediately after the election result the BJP backed Nitish for the post of chief minister, the saffron party dropped three of its top ministers. They were deputy chief minister Sushil KumarModi, and two other old horses, Nand Kishore Yadav and Prem Kumar. The trio had a very good equationwith Nitish. The party instead made less experience, Tarkishore Prasad and Reena Devi as the deputychief ministers.
Besides, the BJP central leadership started twisting the arm of Bihar Chief Minister. The situationhad reached to such a pass that in March 2022 Nitish and the Speaker of Bihar Assembly, Bijay KumarSinha of the BJP, had a heated verbal duel in the House. This was an unprecedented development as bothbelonged to the same ruling alliance. The Janata Dal (United)’s stand then was that the Speaker wasbehaving impartially while conducting the proceedings of the House at the behest of the centralleadership of the BJP.
When Agniveer aspirants went on the warpath in June last year and destroyed the government propertyand targeted the top state level BJP leaders, including Bihar unit president, Sanjay Jaiswal, thelatter strongly criticised the Nitish government for doing nothing.
Though both the parties were still coalition partners, several BJP leaders directly accused NitishKumar for this largescale violence. The Janata Dal (United) position was that the Narendra Modigovernment took such a significance decision on the recruitment in army without even consulting thealliance partners – not to speak of the opposition. Not only that, violence was not only confined toBihar, but the Agniveeraspirants targeted government properties in the BJP-ruled states too, forexample, Uttar Pradesh.
On the issue of Caste Census too, Nitish joined hands with the leader of opposition in Assembly,Tejashwi Prasad Yadav. Though Nitishled an all-party delegation to meet the Prime Minister in August2021, the BJP had its own reservation on the issue.
NARENDRA MODI-NITISH KUMAR RELATIONSHIP
While Nitish had a very good equation with Atal Bihari Vajpayee-Lal Krishna Advani-led BJP, he wasnever comfortable with Narendra Modi. When the BJP national executive met in Patna on June 12-13, 2010, he cancelled the dinner hosted for the top brass of the saffron party. He was furious over the way theGujarat government (then led by Modi) got published an advertisement highlighting how it donated Rsfive crore to Bihar after Kosi flood of August 2018. His government also returned the said amount.
The BJP central leadership immediately swung into damage limitation exercise as the Assembly poll wasdue later the same year. Riding high on the popularity, Nitish then compelled the BJP not to allow Modito campaign in the poll. The NDA swept the election winning 206 seats in the House of 243. The JanataDal (United) alone bagged 115 seats while the BJP 91.
Nitish never liked the dominating style of politics of Modi. Just three months before the Gujarat CMwas made the party’s PM face, Nitish on June 16, 2013 kicked out all the 11 ministers of the saffronparty from his cabinet.
After the humiliating defeat in the 2014 Lok Sabha poll, he joined hands with the Rashtriya Janata Daland Congress.
However, in July 2017 he made a homecoming to the NDA after the BJP raised the railway scam of LaluPrasad Yadav. He was under compulsion as the BJP was clipping his wings. Then came the 2020 Assemblypoll and subsequent developments. Janata Dal (United) could win only 43 seats when it contested 122while the BJP 74 when it fielded candidates in 121 Assembly segments. It was clear that the BJP votesdid not get transferred to Nitish’s party. The latter took it as a stab in the back.
Nitish, who is in the autumn of political career, does not want to face further humiliation. Defyingall pressure, he now finally re-joined the Grand Alliance as he is well aware that there is no futureleft in the Modi-led NDA.
UDDHAV, BADALS FACE NITISH’S LIKE SITUATION
Like Janata Dal (United), Shiv Sena and Shiromani Akali Dal were the oldest allies of the BJP. Butthat was in a different era. After the advent of Modi in 2014, the saffron party made concerted effortsto finish off old friends. While split was engineered in Shiv Sena, the BJP joined hands with CaptainAmarinder Singh and not SAD in the last Assembly election of 2022. This was a clear-cut signal forNitish.
Today none of the three most trusted former allies of the BJP is in a position to return to the NDAfold.So, unlike in the past, the BJP strategy is to mount legal pressure on Lalu and his party and at thesame time eat into the remaining vote bank of Nitish, who had already lost his earlier touch.
The central leadership of the BJP does not want regional satraps from the saffron party either to growstrong. Even in the election-bound Karnataka, it has cut to size veteran former chief minister B SYediyurappa. The party has made chief minister Basavaraj Bommai as the chairman of the ElectionCampaign Committee, though it is using Yediyurappa as a figurehead. It wants to win the election onlyin the name of Narendra Modi.
In Maharashtra, the former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis was made to work under less experiencedleader of the breakaway faction of Shiv Sena, Eknath Shinde.In Bihar former deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi has been totally sidelined.
As a seasoned politician, Nitish knows the strategy of the new BJP, which used to keep him in highesteem during the Vajpayee-Advani years.
MOVE AGAINST LALU
Independent Bihar-watchers are of the view that the non-stop campaign against Lalu Prasad and hisextended family – barring his eldest son Tej Pratap – may backfire. But the BJP thinks that there is noother option left to deal with this old survivor, who has bounced back repeatedly.
While the heat has been turned on Aam Aadmi Party, Trinamool Congress, Bharatiya Rashtriya Samiti andYSR Congress to keep them away from joining hands with the Indian National Congress – and these partiesare falling in line – Lalu and Uddhav Thackeray are hard nut to crack and are still working for a strongnational alternative against BJP before 2024 Lok Sabha poll.
In this scenario, one can say that the news about the possible return of Nitish to the saffron camp isa part of well-planned concerted campaign to keep the masses confused and distract attention from thereal strategy of the BJP.