SUMAN K SHRIVASTAVA
Ranchi, June 28: Some two and half years after the BJP faced defeat in the Assembly elections, the saffron brigade is yet to regain its foothold among them in Jharkhand. The party’s defeat in the bypoll in Mandar, a seat reserved for tribals, may indicate so.
The BJP has lost the bypoll in Mandar at a time when it has nominated former Jharkhand Governor Droupadi Murmu as the first Adivasi woman to get the President post. The BJP leadership also let Babulal Marandi rejoin the party and nominated him to lead the party’s legislature party. Union Tribal Affairs Minister Arjun Munda has also been taking several initiatives for the development of tribals. The party had also organised a ‘Biswas rally’ on June 5 to woo the tribals back on June 5, addressed by party chief J P Nadda.
Also, there have been slew of centrally sponsored welfare schemes being implemented to woo the people at the grassroot level. Besides, several leaders of the JMM-Congress-RJD ruling combine are facing serious corruption charges and the BJP has launched an intensive campaign against them.
“The BJP has got over 90 percent of the Sadan (native non-tribals) votes Though we also got a good number of tribal votes, we are yet to connect with them fully. They (tribals) still fear us (BJP),” said a BJP leader who campaigned in Mandar.
Though tribal vote share is less than one-third, Jharkhand emotionally remains a tribal state, where the image of Raghubar Das government became of one government that was anti-tribal in nature.
On the other hand, the Muslims and Christian tribals voted aggressively and in unison for the Congress. Earlier, the tribal Christians and Muslims voted differently but the anti-conversion law united them to vote against the BJP.
There are around 1.75 lakh tribal votes in the Mandar Assembly constituency. Sarna tribal dharma Guru Bandhan Tigga also supported Bandhu Tirkey’s daughter Shilpi Neha Tirkey, a Congress candidate.
The BJP pinned hopes on Asaduddin Owaisi who had supported BJP rebel Dev Kumar Dhan. But he could not cut ice with the Muslim voters.
But then, it was more of a personal victory for Bandhu Tirkey than that of the Congress. Though the bypoll had been necessitated due to disqualification of Bandhu in a corruption case, his public image is not that of a corrupt person. “So, the corruption issue raised by the BJP during the electioneering did not work,” pointed out a BJP leader.
Besides, Bandhu had been connected with the voters 24×7. He had grabbed this seat in the 2019 election as a nominee of the JVM.
On the other hand, BJP candidate Gangotri Kujur, who bagged the seat in 2014, had been denied ticket in the 2019 election. Though she was appointed vice president of the State BJP, she lost connect with the voters. “It is not easy to get connected with the voters in a month or two. Still, the BJP improved its vote share tally,” said a BJP leader.
Dev Kumar Dhan, who had fought the 2019 elections on the BJP ticket, alongwith his friend Subhash Munda spearheaded the movement against Eklavya Vidyalaya in Silagain, local language controversies. Dhan received over 22,000 votes and Subhash got around 10,000 votes, which were mostly from the Sarna tribals.
In 2019, the JMM won more than 20 of the 28 reserved seats – a clear case of tribals moving from the BJP camp to the JMM side. In 2014, the BJP-led alliance had won 13 out of 28 assembly seats reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidates.
Only six months ago, Jharkhand had given a favourable mandate to Narendra Modi in the Lok Sabha election. But in the Jharkhand Assembly election, people definitely judged the BJP as a party and Raghubar Das as the head of a BJP government. Both failed in popular mandate in Jharkhand.
The amendment to the land acquisition law was seen by tribals as an assault on their rights by the BJP government. Creation of land banks confounded the tribal voters further.
Pathalgadi movement was another issue that hurt the BJP in Jharkhand. This was an expression that demanded that the rights of tribals must be recognised by the government of the day.
The anti-conversion bill was another troubling aspect. The tribal Christians, who had voted for the BJP-AJSU alliance in 2014 saw the anti-conversion bill as a move to target them.
BJP tests defeat in JMM-Congress stronghold
The defeat nonetheless was disturbing for the BJP, which was the fourth one in a row since the 2019 elections. First, it was Dumka, vacated by Chief Minister Hemant Soren, and won by his brother Basant Soren. Thereafter, the BJP tasted defeat in Bermo. The seat had fallen vacant after Congress MLA Rajendra Prasad Singh died. His son Anup Singh was declared victorious on this seat. Again, the JMM retained the Madhupur seat, which fell vacant after the demise of Haji Hussain Ansari. His son Hafijul Ansari retained the seat.
“All these seats were the sitting seats of the JMM-Congress and had been won traditionally by them. The BJP had not been a major player. Still, we feel that the BJP has to work hard to regain the lost ground,” said a BJP leader. “We have to take measures and work hard to set the social equation right,” he added.