oppn parties Bihar: BJP-JD (U) Upbeat, But It Is Not Going To Be A Cakewalk

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  • Supreme Court dismisses industry bodies' plea to stop the SBI from disclosing the numbers of the electoral bonds
  • NDA finalizes seat sharing in Bihar - BJP 17, JD(U) 16 aqnd LJP 5
  • Election Commission removes Home secretaries of Gujarat, UP, Bihar, HP, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand and the DGP of Bengal
  • Telangana governor Tamilsai Soundararajan resigned from his post and is likely to contest for the BJP from Chennai
  • ED claims K Kavitha of the BRS paid Kejriwal and Sisodia Rs 100cr in the alleged liquor scam in Delhi. AAP says this is a ploy to malign their names
  • Supreme Court tells SBI not to be selective and disclose full details of electoral bonds
  • With the US Department of Justice rpobing bribery charges against Adani group companies, Adani group shares and bonds are under pressure
  • Narayan Murthy gifts Infosys shares worth Rs 240cr to his 4-month-old grandson
  • Tata Sons to sell Rs 9362cr worth shares of TCS to pare debt
  • Stocks were positive on Monday - Sesex climbed 104 points to 72748 and Nifty 32 points to 22055
  • IOA dissolves the ad-hoc panel and gives full control of WFI to elected panel headed by Brij Bhushan aide Sanjay Singh
  • Controversy erupts after BJP leader Tathagata Roy prescribes the cicumcision test for those seeking citizenship under CAA. TMC calls it a 'vulgar jibe'
  • Rahul Gandhi concludes his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra in Mumbai, holds a mega rally at Shivaji Park and says the BJP does not have the courage to change the Constitution despite making a lot of noise in that regard
  • ED issues two fresh summons to Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal in the liqour excise case just a day after he got bail in the earlier cases of ignoring the summons
  • A 14-year-old girl killed herself after she was strip-searched at school in Bagalkot in Karnataka
Election Commission orders removal of home secretaries of 6 states and the DGP of Bengal
oppn parties
Bihar: BJP-JD (U) Upbeat, But It Is Not Going To Be A Cakewalk

By Sunil Garodia
First publised on 2020-06-09 16:24:05

About the Author

Sunil Garodia Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator.

Amit Shah kicked off the campaign for the ensuing state elections in Bihar by digitally addressing party workers in the state. It provided a glimpse of how election rallies will look like for a long time now as the country grapples with the fallout of the pandemic. Shah was upbeat and predicted a two-thirds majority for the ruling alliance. He also waxed eloquent on the 'exemplary' way in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had handled the Covid-19 crisis and also praised Nitish Kumar for his efforts in containing the spread of the virus in Bihar. He also said that the BJP-JD(U) alliance had delivered on good governance.

But the ground reality is different. Nitish Kumar's track record in this term of office has been uninspiring, to put it mildly. There have been no fresh initiatives by the government and the state seems to be running on auto-pilot.  Nitish Kumar has, throughout the current term, never displayed the zeal with which he transformed Bihar in his first and second terms as chief minister. Kumar was slow to react when the migrant crisis erupted despite Bihar having a huge workforce that is employed in other states. It is still searching for responses as the return of migrant workers has caused a huge spurt in coronavirus cases. If voting is held purely on the basis of performance, the ruling alliance might even lose.

But the alliance is lucky to have the better of the caste calculations, the major plank on which elections are lost or won in the state. The BJP brings in the upper caste votes while the JD (U) gets the backward communities and the Dalits. With a part of the Yadav's also ditching the opposition RJD during the Lok Sabha elections, this translates into a winning combination. But the RJD, despite Lalu Prasad being in jail and Tejaswi Yadav not showing the same charisma, is a formidable opponent. It has the state's sizeable Muslim community on its side and if it can win back the Yadav vote, it can still spring a surprise. The BJP-JD (U) alliance cannot take things lightly and will have to be spot-on in the selection of candidates and will have to counter local issues that may crop up. It will also have to provide employment to the vast number of returning migrant workers if they choose not to go back. In that case, remittances will also dip significantly and it will have to manage the economy with a depleted coffer. It is not going to be a cakewalk despite the state of the opposition.