On May 12, a video from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s roadshow in Patna went viral on social media. In it, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of the Janata Dal (United) can be seen standing meekly beside his alliance partner Modi, holding a cutout of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s election symbol, the lotus. Many social media users commented that it showed how Kumar, who was once seen as a prime ministerial candidate himself, had been relegated to the sidelines.
Why is Kumar, the chief minister of a major state for nearly two decades, being forced to play second fiddle to the BJP?
Reporting from Bihar, Scroll found that the answer lay in the fact that Kumar and his party, the Janata Dal (United) were fast losing relevance. A common sentiment shared by several Biharis in six Lok Sabha constituencies where Scroll visited from was that Kumar’s political career was on the last legs.
Besides anti-incumbency, discontent over matters like unemployment and the lack of a second line of leadership in the Janata Dal (United) has resulted in the party’s support base seeking other options. Many also said that Kumar had lost his credibility by frequently switching between alliances.
Existential crisis
Kalyan Bigha village in Bihar’s Nalanda district stands out not just for being home to Kumar. Located about 60 kilometres away from Patna, Kalyan Bigha boasts of a government hospital, a higher secondary school, a government-run Industrial Training Institute, a power sub-station and wide roads leading to a four-lane national highway. It is rare for a village in Bihar to have such infrastructure.
Yet, when Scroll met a group of villagers in Kalyan Bigha in mid-April, they had complaints about Kumar. The discontent largely centred around a single theme: unemployment. “Our boys have to go to other states for jobs,” said Rajkumar Mandal, a farmer in his 40s. “Nitish has been in power for 20 years, has he even set up one big factory that provides jobs?”
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