Inspired by Jayaprakash Narayan’s movement and fuelled by their united opposition to the Congress, a diverse group of political and student activists joined the JP movement when Indira Gandhi imposed the Emergency exactly 40 years ago in 1975.
It was this antipathy towards the grand old party and Indira Gandhi’s audacious move to suspend all democratic norms that led persons from differing ideologies to come together to form a new political outfit, the Janata Party, in the run-up to the 1977 Lok Sabha elections.
But 40 years later, the key players in the JP movement – the socialists and the Bharatiya Janata Party (known as as the Jan Sangh in its earlier avatar) – find themselves on opposite sides of the political divide as anti-Congress sentiment has gradually given way to an anti-BJP sentiment.
It is particularly ironical that leaders from the socialist stream – Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav and Janata Dal (U) leaders Nitish Kumar – who see themselves as Jayaprakash Narayan’s rightful political heirs, are today aligned with the Congress, the very party against which he waged war and which had defined their political identity.
As a result, these leaders are constrained in going too far in attacking the Congress and highlighting their own role in battling the Emergency. This has left the field open for the BJP to appropriate Jayaprakash Narayan’s legacy and also to use it to mount an effective offensive against its chief political rival, the Congress.
Anti-Congressism
Nitish Kumar, Lalu Prasad Yadav and Sharad Yadav built their political careers by taking on the Congress, the main political force in the country in the 1970s, when they joined the JP movement to battle the Emergency.
Nitish Kumar was a student leader in Patna University when he was jailed during that period. Inspired by Jayaprakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia, and Karpoori Thakur, Nitish Kumar joined politics after his stint in jail and was firmly entrenched in the anti-Congress camp. Coming from the same stock, his JD(U) colleague Sharad Yadav, a Jayaprakash Narayan favourite, has been a known Congress critic.
Also a product of the JP movement, Lalu Prasad Yadav was instrumental in the formation of the Chhatra Sangharsh Samiti as president of the Patna University Students Union which spearheaded a campaign against Indira Gandhi and her brand of politics.
The three along with another socialist leader, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayum Singh Yadav, were together in the V.P. Singh-led Janata Dal, which managed to dethrone the Rajiv Gandhi government in the wake of the Bofors bribery scandal. The fledgling party got the support of two ideologically opposed parties – the BJP and the Left – when it came to power in 1989. They were bound together by their common visceral dislike for the Congress.
Changing equations
However, these alignments and loyalties have changed dramatically over the years. The first crack came in the late 1980s when the BJP launched the Ram Temple movement in response to VP Singh’s decision to implement the long-pending Mandal Commission report providing for reservations for the Other Backward Classes.
The BJP soon replaced the Congress in the hit list of the socialists following the communal polarisation unleashed by the saffron party’s temple agenda. Lalu Prasad Yadav, who was the Bihar chief minister, made his intention clear when he ordered the arrest of veteran BJP leader LK Advani in 1990 when his rath yatra was passing through his home state. The RJD chief has been a trenchant critic of the BJP since then.
Lalu Prasad Yadav gradually abandoned his opposition to the Congress and became the first to publicly declare his support for Sonia Gandhi at a time when there was a raging storm over her foreign origins. The RJD was a key member of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government after both parties acknowledged that “like-minded parties” needed to come together to fight the rise of communal forces (read the BJP). Mulayum Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party also extended outside support to the UPA government on the same premise.
While these two leaders joined the battle with the BJP, Nitish Kumar and Sharad Yadav held out. There was no change in their hostility towards the Congress. Their loyalty to George Fernandes and the political reality in Bihar pushed them into forging a partnership with the BJP which lasted 14 years. Nitish Kumar broke up with the BJP months before the last Lok Sabha election to protest Narendra Modi’s projection as the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate.
The political landscape has undergone a sea change in the past year. Nitish Kumar has embraced his old Janata Dal colleague and old political rival, Lalu Prasad Yadav, to put up a united fight against the BJP in the coming Bihar assembly elections. And, like the RJD chief, Nitish Kumar too has abandoned his earlier opposition to the Congress and is willing to do business with his one-time political foe.
This realignment has been forced upon these one-time diehard Congress opponents after the BJP replaced the grand old party as the main political force in the country, posing a serious threat to their political survival.
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It was this antipathy towards the grand old party and Indira Gandhi’s audacious move to suspend all democratic norms that led persons from differing ideologies to come together to form a new political outfit, the Janata Party, in the run-up to the 1977 Lok Sabha elections.
But 40 years later, the key players in the JP movement – the socialists and the Bharatiya Janata Party (known as as the Jan Sangh in its earlier avatar) – find themselves on opposite sides of the political divide as anti-Congress sentiment has gradually given way to an anti-BJP sentiment.
It is particularly ironical that leaders from the socialist stream – Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav and Janata Dal (U) leaders Nitish Kumar – who see themselves as Jayaprakash Narayan’s rightful political heirs, are today aligned with the Congress, the very party against which he waged war and which had defined their political identity.
As a result, these leaders are constrained in going too far in attacking the Congress and highlighting their own role in battling the Emergency. This has left the field open for the BJP to appropriate Jayaprakash Narayan’s legacy and also to use it to mount an effective offensive against its chief political rival, the Congress.
Anti-Congressism
Nitish Kumar, Lalu Prasad Yadav and Sharad Yadav built their political careers by taking on the Congress, the main political force in the country in the 1970s, when they joined the JP movement to battle the Emergency.
Nitish Kumar was a student leader in Patna University when he was jailed during that period. Inspired by Jayaprakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia, and Karpoori Thakur, Nitish Kumar joined politics after his stint in jail and was firmly entrenched in the anti-Congress camp. Coming from the same stock, his JD(U) colleague Sharad Yadav, a Jayaprakash Narayan favourite, has been a known Congress critic.
Also a product of the JP movement, Lalu Prasad Yadav was instrumental in the formation of the Chhatra Sangharsh Samiti as president of the Patna University Students Union which spearheaded a campaign against Indira Gandhi and her brand of politics.
The three along with another socialist leader, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayum Singh Yadav, were together in the V.P. Singh-led Janata Dal, which managed to dethrone the Rajiv Gandhi government in the wake of the Bofors bribery scandal. The fledgling party got the support of two ideologically opposed parties – the BJP and the Left – when it came to power in 1989. They were bound together by their common visceral dislike for the Congress.
Changing equations
However, these alignments and loyalties have changed dramatically over the years. The first crack came in the late 1980s when the BJP launched the Ram Temple movement in response to VP Singh’s decision to implement the long-pending Mandal Commission report providing for reservations for the Other Backward Classes.
The BJP soon replaced the Congress in the hit list of the socialists following the communal polarisation unleashed by the saffron party’s temple agenda. Lalu Prasad Yadav, who was the Bihar chief minister, made his intention clear when he ordered the arrest of veteran BJP leader LK Advani in 1990 when his rath yatra was passing through his home state. The RJD chief has been a trenchant critic of the BJP since then.
Lalu Prasad Yadav gradually abandoned his opposition to the Congress and became the first to publicly declare his support for Sonia Gandhi at a time when there was a raging storm over her foreign origins. The RJD was a key member of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government after both parties acknowledged that “like-minded parties” needed to come together to fight the rise of communal forces (read the BJP). Mulayum Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party also extended outside support to the UPA government on the same premise.
While these two leaders joined the battle with the BJP, Nitish Kumar and Sharad Yadav held out. There was no change in their hostility towards the Congress. Their loyalty to George Fernandes and the political reality in Bihar pushed them into forging a partnership with the BJP which lasted 14 years. Nitish Kumar broke up with the BJP months before the last Lok Sabha election to protest Narendra Modi’s projection as the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate.
The political landscape has undergone a sea change in the past year. Nitish Kumar has embraced his old Janata Dal colleague and old political rival, Lalu Prasad Yadav, to put up a united fight against the BJP in the coming Bihar assembly elections. And, like the RJD chief, Nitish Kumar too has abandoned his earlier opposition to the Congress and is willing to do business with his one-time political foe.
This realignment has been forced upon these one-time diehard Congress opponents after the BJP replaced the grand old party as the main political force in the country, posing a serious threat to their political survival.
