By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
The historical verdict of the Bihar 2015 has send
shock waves in the Hindutva camp while gladdening the heart of every Indian who
believed in inclusive secularism and protecting the idea of India as enshrined in
our republican constitution and the hero of this verdict is Lalu Prasad Yadav,
a man mocked by the urban elite, even of the ‘secular’ variety and news
channels even today did not feel ashamed of commenting on him as ‘thug’, a word
which they will never dare to describe those in power in Delhi. The nation
remain thankful to this earthy man for what he has done in Bihar by repeating
what he did on October 23rd 1990 at Samastipur where Lal Krishna Advani was arrested during his (w)rath yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya.
Today, Advani’s charioteer is the prime minister of India and Lalu and his ‘Mahagathbandhan’
has given an unforgettable ‘gift’ to Lal Krishna Advani on his birthday. One
does not know whether Advani is happy with the verdict in Bihar or remembering
the happening of the things exactly 25 years ago. There are so many
similarities here 25 years later and lesson learnt politically. Mulayam ditched
the grand alliance exactly showing the same traits as he did betraying the
forces of Mandal and allying with those who had no interest in protecting the
political and social interest of the Dalits and marginalised. Lalu put a break
to the great designs of Lal Krishna Advani and standing rock like with the then
prime minister V P Singh whose government was voted out in Parliament for
protecting India’s constitution and providing rights to India’s Bahujan masses.
It is for the first time in political history that a government fell for
fulfilling its constitution obligation to the nation that time when the entire
nation faced the worst ever threat from the exclusivism of Hindutva which
thrive for a theocratic state.
The importance of this victory of the secular alliance
is enormous for the country and need replications. Lalu and Nitish showed
greater statesmanship by coming together ignoring all their minor differences
and egos. Adding Congress to their side was another important factor which gave
them strength to widened their base and the grand old party of India also need
to Mandalised if it want to strengthen its base. The message from Bihar is
clear that forces of social justice will reject all kind of religious
fanaticism and would want their share in power structure. Ironically, none
remembered VP Singh during this campaign not even his old friends including
Lalu and Nitish even when they lost know time in ‘claiming’ the ‘legacy’ of Jai
Prakash Narayan. It was not shocking to hear because none wanted to antagonize
the ‘upper caste’ votes and therefore V P Singh remained unwanted during the
‘campaign’. The caste media would
immediately tag all these people as Mandalites and casteists and therefore Jai
Prakash became the most uttered word by not just Nitish and other Samajwadi
leaders but by the BJP. Bihar’s result show that it is VP Singh whose Mandal
legacy work and will remain more relevant than ever despite our aversion to the
man. The forces of Social Justice must revive his legacy to make their presence
felt everywhere and JP’s legacy would not work as it only strengthend the Sangh
Parivar.
Bihar showed that secularism is essentially inclusive
and has to include the most marginalized. It cannot be merely discussed
philosophically but in pure terms of participation and representation of
communities. These elections clearly showed that BJP can only fight with
Congress using Communal-secular divide but can not really take on when the
question of social justice and caste identities emerge. Everywhere BJP’s track
record has been using the caste identities and then imposing a leadership of
different community. Example of Chhattishgarh, Jharkhand and Haryana are well
known and people feel deceived of it.
Bihar’s victory is the revival of Mandal forces who
were definitely feeling isolated and outdated. During the elections Lalu Yadav
raised issues of caste discrimination, reservation of the Dalits and OBCs,
issue of beef and communalism. Narendra Modi and his team tried to polarize the
elections in different way by unleashing lies everywhere. Never in the history
of India, we had seen a prime minister stooping so low in debate when he said that
Lalu and Nitish were trying to ‘steal’ quota of SC-OBCs and give it to Muslims.
How can a Prime Minister speak such a language which has blatantly communal tone?
It is not surprising for Narendra Modi as has used ‘Pakistan’ to polarize the
voters and presenting him and his party as the sole champion of Hindus and
Hindu India and any one voting others means celebration in Pakistan. And such
shameless rhetoric did not stop as Amit Shah, the chief commander of Narendra
Modi spoke same language suggesting that if BJP lost there will be celebrations
in Pakistan.
There is no denial of fact that BJP used money, media
and mafia power to influence the voters. The enormous finance it has in its
disposal is threatening democracy and it has emboldened those forces who feel
they can buy people and circumvent democracy.
During the last general elections we have seen the power of money, media
and mafia as late Kanshiram would always warn his cadres to be vary off, as
they are engaged in distorting and misinterpreting information. It is also true
that people may be illiterate but know well as that ‘king’ can ‘do’ ‘wrong’ and
therefore need to be punished severely. ‘Yeh public hai sab janati hai’. People
know everything about their leaders.
The country is watching regularly how the Hindutva’s
rabble-rousers abusing the ordinary citizens, dictating us how we should live,
eat and behave. Everywhere we see their moral policing and worst kind of
violent behavior. It was wonderful when Lalu countered them vociferously that
Hindus too eat beef and that the Sangh Parivar was anti Dalit and anti poor. A
number of cases have been filed against Lalu Yadav and we know it well how the
Hindutva’s trolls have been threatening secular human rights activists
everywhere from social media to public life. It is not just threat of physical
intimidation but also ‘legal action’.
BJP tried to break the ‘Mahagathbandhan’ of Lalu with
taking away Mulayam Singh Yadav. It is the defeat of Mulayam’s opportunistic
politics which he always did and remained on the wrong side of history. In
1990, Mulayam sided with anti mandal forces led by Chandrashekhar and this time
he tried to hobnob with the BJP even speaking openly that it was BJP wave
everywhere. History has repeated itself. Modi and all the samajwadis
spoke of Jai Prakash Naraian but none of them uttered a word in the name of VP
Singh. Frankly speaking Nitish and Lalu are not the product of JP but of VP.
They might have been there during JP’s movement but who cared for them? When
did JP raise the issue of the most marginalized, Pasmandas and aadivasis? It is
the Mandal revolution that brought leaders like Lalu Yadav, Nitish Kumar,
Sharad Yadav and Ram Vilas Paswan to the fore and their voices became heavier
and powerful. Ofcourse, there was party like BSP and Ambedkarites who had been
fighting this battle for long but not stronger that time to influence the
parliamentary politics. So VP Singh’s Mandal decision is the most historical
action of a political leader in independent India and it created a huge lot of
talented leader from the hitherto unrepresented sections. VP Singh put his life
to risk fighting against Hindutva forces and perhaps it is time for the leaders
of Mandal movement to carry forward that legacy and spread it across the
country.
The massive mandate to Lalu-Nitish show that Mandal
will always remain more powerful than Kamandal if used properly and
educatively. If the secular forces try to become B or A team of BJP they will
be wiped out. This is a warning to Mualayam Singh to mend his ways and stop
flirting with the Hindutva. There is a message for Mayawati too to make proper
alliance in UP and any attempt to hobnob with the Hindutva will throw her
permanently out of state.
For Congress it is time to revisit those events
exactly 25 years ago when they brought down a government for fulfilling its
constitutional mandate to protect a religious place in Ayodhya. Yes, on
November 7th, 1990, VP Singh government was brought down by the
combine strength of BJP and Congress just because it stopped Advani’s hate
yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya. Advani was requested to stop the yatra as it had
unleashed a death train everywhere and Lalu Yadav, the then chief minister of
Bihar stopped it and got Advani arrested in Samastipur on October 23rd,
1990. Interestingly, the District Magistrate that time who arrested Advani was
R.K Singh, who is now the Member of Parliament of the BJP. On 7th
November 1990 Congress played the dirtiest card in its history by allowing the
fall of the VP Singh government as BJP has withdrawn the support. Congress
betrayed not just Muslims but also the OBCs as it clandestinely supported anti
Mandal forces. This time too Congress tried to dissociate with Lalu in the name
of his being ‘tainted’ ignoring his full-fledged support to Manmohan Singh government in Delhi.
Congress paid heavy price since 1990. It is not BJP
but VP Singh who brought the congress to this level but the fact is Congress
can not blame him for this unless it changes its party structure and current
leadership of the caste Hindus and soft Hindutva people and create new young
leaders of Dalits, OBCs, Muslims and AAdivasis. We acknowledge its wide base
all over the country but it need strong ideological strength and dedication to
social justice and secularism which unfortunately is questionable as it always
played the brahmanical secularism or purely
‘multiculturalism’ strengthening the soft Hindutva line and got
decimated. They made right choices in Bihar and now looking for revival in the
state now but if they still look for the same social space as earlier the party
will remain on the periphery in both Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
Bihar has given a huge sigh of relief to all of us. It
has also taught a lesson to those Dalit leaders who shifted their loyalties so
easily. People like Jeetan Ram Manjhi have no future as they betrayed the
cause. Sitting with corporate Hindutva these discredited people cant do justice
to their own communities who are suffering because of the government politics.
Ram Vilas Paswan will be used in Uttar Pradesh against Mayawati and so will be
other leaders.
Lalu Yadav’s stoppage of rath yatra of Advani was
responsible for the fall of VP Singh government but with this massive victory
in Bihar he has avenged that defeat 25 years ago and given Lal Krishna Advani
his ‘best’ ‘birthday’ gift as well as thrown a challenge to his ‘charioteer
Narendra Modi who had benefitted that time.
There will be efforts by the corrupt casteist media to
deviate from the real issues of Bihar but the fact is that Mandal has shown its
strength now and it is time to unleash those forces all over the country. Secondly,
need to challenge Hindutva at all level by exposing them thoroughly as Lalu
could do quoting extensively from Golwalkar’s ‘Bunch of thoughts’ and ‘we and
our nationhood’.
Frankly more than BJP, it is the Indian corporate
thugs who got defeated today. If you had watched the elections analysis and
prior to that the exit polls etc, you will realize how media played different
games. In IBN-CNN exit polls actually JDU lead Mahagathbandhan was given over
175 seats but that poll was not broadcasted for the fear of antagonizing Amit
Shah and other leaders of the party. Times Now’s C voter had predicted a
massive victory for BJP. Arnab Goswami was actually behaving as lynchman in the
studio on behalf of the Sangh Parivar. NDTV did not lag behind in showing its
‘impartiality’ when Pranoy Roy, the guru of psephology in India declared at 9
am in the morning that BJP and the allies are going to get absolute majority.
One need to ask basic question as why all the TV
channels create such ruckus during the counting of votes this time. Why was it
that every channel was reporting differently and the gap was too high ? How can
channel be so wrong on the actual thing was happening? These are important
aspect and thought for others. Was it because paid media was trying to hide
facts from people? Was it because it was creating ground for BJP to come to
power and in case there is a coalition government, it could use division of
perception and impose its own agenda?
Bihar has given its verdict and the nation remain
thankful to people of Bihar that they have protected our constitution but the
threat is not over yet. It will be foolish to think that Hindutva is over and
hate propaganda does not work. Mujaffarnagar worked and paid heavy
dividend. Learning from Bihar, it is
time all secular parties must learn that their time has come to Mandalise
themselves and provide representations to all the Dalit, aadivasis, OBCs,
Padmandas at all level. It is equally important to expose the corporate
Hindutva nexus and that the Muslims are being made scapegoat but the real
target of these regressive forces is to stop the rising assertion of the
Bahujan Samaj.
The secular polity will only succeed if they include
all the pasmanda communities in its network and provide them space and
representation. If they fail, the Hindutva will rise again. VP Singh’s
government fell for this purpose when Congress BJP joined hand but 25 years
later Lalu-Nitish-Congress combine have defeated BJP in Bihar and they must
confess that it is Mandal who brought them biggest mandate in Bihar. It is
Mandal alone, which will defeat the Kamandal forces and bring social justice
secularism in India. Mandal forces had bitten dust during the past 10 years
because of the egos of politicians and division among them giving rise to
Hindutva’s brahmanical forces hence it is time for celebration for the revival
of Mandal which decimated Hindutva’s agenda in Bihar and has potential to do so
in the entire country.