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Though he is bargaining hard with the BJP for an equal number of Lok Sabha seats in Bihar, Nitish Kumar is playing not for the big battle in 2019, but for 2020.
Amit Shah’s Thursday visit to Patna is obviously a goodwill gesture by the BJP chief towards Nitish Kumar, who has, of late, shown signs of becoming disenchanted with the ‘big brother’ BJP.
The two meetings, on one day, are uncharacteristic of Amit Shah’s style of functioning. He drove straight from the airport to the state guest-house to partake in a sattu paratha-jalebi breakfast with Nitish Kumar, and later in the evening to have dinner with him at his residence. Both wore broad smiles as they came out of their breakfast meeting but did not say anything. This photo-op would not have taken place unless there was optimism about reaching the broad contours of an understanding by both sides.
We Are Friends Forever
During the day, Shah had told the opposition to stop ”drooling” about the possibility of Nitish Kumar crossing sides. He asserted that the Bihar leader would remain with the NDA.
In the last few days, there have been indications of the BJP climbing down from its earlier position and meeting Kumar half way, with reports of a 20:20 division of the Lok Sabha seats.
Nitish Kumar is speculated to be adjusting Ram Vilas Paswan from his pool and the BJP adjusting other smaller parties like Upendra Kushwaha’s RLSP and Pappu Yadav from its quota.
Of late, Nitish and Paswan have met several times, fuelling speculation about their forging a “third front” in Bihar. However, this would have been a non-starter in a state which is steadily becoming polarised between Laloo Yadav’s RJD-plus and the BJP-plus.
The insiders in the JD(U) say that Nitish Kumar will not go below 15 seats, and it is possible that Paswan may be persuaded to accept 5, if his family members are all adjusted.
Nitish Kumar’s 20-20 Game
A “20:20” division of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar would give a boost to Nitish Kumar, reinforcing an impression of a parity of status between the JD(U) and the BJP. In recent weeks, JD(U) leaders have been insisting that Nitish Kumar should lead the Lok Sabha campaign in Bihar.
Through the various manoeuvres he has made in the recent past, Nitish Kumar is not only trying to prevent his party from becoming irrelevant, the thrust of his recent moves has also been to ensure that he remains the senior partner in Bihar in 2019. He, therefore, aims to be the leader of the combine in 2020 state elections and remain its chief ministerial candidate if the alliance wins.
Earlier, the BJP had talked about seat-sharing being on the basis of the 2014 performance of parties. The JD(U) had won only two Lok Sabha seats and the BJP had clocked 22, with Paswan’s Lok Jan Shakti party getting six and Upendra Kushwaha three. Nitish Kumar had, on the other hand, insisted that the seats be apportioned on the basis of the 2015 results. He had also made it clear that the JD(U)’s stance would depend on how many seats the BJP would offer it for the 2019 battle.
BJP Needs Its Allies
Both the BJP and the JD(U) are acutely conscious of their vulnerabilities today. Given the BJP’s losses in recent bypolls, including those in Bihar, it knows it has to retain its allies for the 2019 battle.
There are also murmurs about the possibility of the TDP bringing a no-confidence motion against the NDA Government in the monsoon session, which would bring the BJP under pressure. The ruling party will have to keep all its allies by its side.
Not long ago, Amit Shah had made a similar visit to Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai. The Shiv Sena too faces a dilemma similar to the one confronting the JD(U). It cannot go with the Congress-NCP combine while going alone in 2019 is going to be risky for the party. Yet, it wants to recapture its position of being the senior partner in the state polls, which could be held along with the general elections. Therefore, like the JD(U), it is only natural for it to try and drive a hard bargain with the BJP. When push comes to shove, the BJP too would not want to part company with the Sena, or the JD(U), if it can help it.
Can Nitish Switch to Laloo Again?
Nitish Kumar broke with the ‘Mahagathbandhan’ exactly a year ago, though he had shown signs of distancing from the RJD over a period: first by welcoming the surgical strikes, then praising demonetisation, and finally crossing over to the NDA again. Many view his decision to exit the ‘Mahagathbandhan’ as the biggest mistake of his political career, for he might have been the prime ministerial candidate of the entire opposition today.
In going against the 2015 mandate the people of Bihar had given him and Laloo Yadav, Nitish lost some of his earlier sheen. Losing a seat he had held—Jokihat— in a recent bypoll to the RJD was a sign of which way the winds had started to blow. It did not help that Modi had neither inducted any JD(U) leader in his cabinet during the recent expansion nor taken Nitish’s demand for a special category status for Bihar seriously.
Nitish Kumar began to distance himself from the BJP. He boycotted the international day of yoga in Bihar. He called up an incarcerated Laloo in a Mumbai hospital to enquire about his health. Earlier, he had gone to Laloo’s son Tej Pratap Yadav’s wedding. The Congress too began to explore ways in which he could return to Bihar’s grand alliance. All these were meant to be signals to the BJP that he could have other options up his sleeve again.
But Tejeshawi Yadav has ruled out his return to the Mahagathbandhan, though by all accounts, Laloo had begun to soften.
Nitish Kumar knows he cannot do without an alliance in Bihar for he does not enjoy the backing of a large community, as does Laloo. He has to piggyback on another party to remain politically relevant. It is an irony, though, that a contender for PMship in 2019 should now be bending over backwards to remain where he is now – CM of Bihar in 2020.
(Neerja Chowdhury is a senior journalist. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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