Last month Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared that Lalu Prasad’s RJD stood for Rozaana Jungle-raaj kaa Darr" ‒the daily fear of the jungle-raj or lawlessness. A few weeks later, he reminded Bihar’s electorate of the Rashtriya Janata Dal chief’s stint in jail, asserting that people come out of prison “learning bad things”. And, after the Central Bureau of Investigation challenged the Jharkhand High Court’s order of dropping some fodder scam charges against Lalu Prasad, the Supreme Court, on Monday, has issued a notice to him.
Why is Modi’s make-or-break battle in Bihar getting focused on the RJD leader? Is his Lalu-centric aggression being fuelled by a sense of panic? How much does this panic correspond to political reality on the ground?
By all means, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s experience in last three Assembly elections shows that despite the Janata Dal (United)'s Nitish Kumar being the chief ministerial candidate of the grand secular alliance, it is Lalu’s RJD that poses a real danger to the saffron party’s prospects in the state polls due in October-November.
The big threat
The RJD is the BJP’s enemy number one in the majority of the seats that the saffron party considers safe.
Out of 91 seats the BJP won in the 2010 Assembly elections, 29 are constituencies that the party has retained in all the last three state polls. In addition, there are 13 other seats that the BJP has won in last two elections. Although the BJP is likely to field candidates in 150-160 seats out of the total 243 in the state polls, it looks at these 42 (29+13) seats as relatively safer than other seats it may contest.
The results of the last three elections – held in February 2005, October 2005 and 2010 – show that the RJD has considerable presence in the majority of even these 42 seats. In many of them, the saffron party’s victory margins have not been very high.
In the February 2005 polls, for instance, the RJD came second to the BJP in 16 out of the 29 seats the saffron party had won three times. In 12 of these, the saffron party’s victory margin was less than 15,000 votes. Similarly in the October 2005 polls, the RJD trailed the BJP in 18 out of these 29 seats, and once again in 12 seats the victory margin was less than 15,000 votes. In the 2010 election, in which Lalu Prasad gave away several seats to his alliance partner Ramvilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party, the RJD was second to the BJP in 13 of these 29 seats. Of these 13, the BJP’s victory margin in nine seats was less than 15,000 votes.
Threatening the core
The picture is no different in the other 13 seats which the BJP has won consecutively in the last two state polls. In the October 2005 election, out of these 13 seats, the RJD chased BJP quite closely in nine, losing all of them with less than 10,000 votes. Again in the 2010 election, the RJD gave a good fight to the BJP in 10 out of the 13 seats. Of these 10, the RJD lost five seats by a margin of less than 10,000 votes and three others by a margin between 10,000 to 15,000 votes.
Lalu Prasad, therefore, threatens the very core of the BJP’s base in the state. The threat may become even more potent if Nitish Kumar’s support base is added to Lalu Prasad’s traditional voters in these constituencies.
These 42 seats are expected to have a great bearing on the fate of the BJP in Bihar, and their outcome would depend primarily on the extent to which Modi succeeds in eating away at Lalu’s support base, apart from preventing other parties to add to the RJD’s strength. For now, Lalu Prasad continues to remain the main bulwark against the saffron surge, and the BJP, a party desperate to repeat the performance it recorded in the Lok Sabha elections last May.
We welcome your comments at
[email protected].
Why is Modi’s make-or-break battle in Bihar getting focused on the RJD leader? Is his Lalu-centric aggression being fuelled by a sense of panic? How much does this panic correspond to political reality on the ground?
By all means, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s experience in last three Assembly elections shows that despite the Janata Dal (United)'s Nitish Kumar being the chief ministerial candidate of the grand secular alliance, it is Lalu’s RJD that poses a real danger to the saffron party’s prospects in the state polls due in October-November.
The big threat
The RJD is the BJP’s enemy number one in the majority of the seats that the saffron party considers safe.
Out of 91 seats the BJP won in the 2010 Assembly elections, 29 are constituencies that the party has retained in all the last three state polls. In addition, there are 13 other seats that the BJP has won in last two elections. Although the BJP is likely to field candidates in 150-160 seats out of the total 243 in the state polls, it looks at these 42 (29+13) seats as relatively safer than other seats it may contest.
The results of the last three elections – held in February 2005, October 2005 and 2010 – show that the RJD has considerable presence in the majority of even these 42 seats. In many of them, the saffron party’s victory margins have not been very high.
In the February 2005 polls, for instance, the RJD came second to the BJP in 16 out of the 29 seats the saffron party had won three times. In 12 of these, the saffron party’s victory margin was less than 15,000 votes. Similarly in the October 2005 polls, the RJD trailed the BJP in 18 out of these 29 seats, and once again in 12 seats the victory margin was less than 15,000 votes. In the 2010 election, in which Lalu Prasad gave away several seats to his alliance partner Ramvilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party, the RJD was second to the BJP in 13 of these 29 seats. Of these 13, the BJP’s victory margin in nine seats was less than 15,000 votes.
Threatening the core
The picture is no different in the other 13 seats which the BJP has won consecutively in the last two state polls. In the October 2005 election, out of these 13 seats, the RJD chased BJP quite closely in nine, losing all of them with less than 10,000 votes. Again in the 2010 election, the RJD gave a good fight to the BJP in 10 out of the 13 seats. Of these 10, the RJD lost five seats by a margin of less than 10,000 votes and three others by a margin between 10,000 to 15,000 votes.
Lalu Prasad, therefore, threatens the very core of the BJP’s base in the state. The threat may become even more potent if Nitish Kumar’s support base is added to Lalu Prasad’s traditional voters in these constituencies.
These 42 seats are expected to have a great bearing on the fate of the BJP in Bihar, and their outcome would depend primarily on the extent to which Modi succeeds in eating away at Lalu’s support base, apart from preventing other parties to add to the RJD’s strength. For now, Lalu Prasad continues to remain the main bulwark against the saffron surge, and the BJP, a party desperate to repeat the performance it recorded in the Lok Sabha elections last May.