Patna: The audience clapped thunderously at a meeting in Nanded (Maharashtra) in March 2014 when Narendra Modi announced in his inimitable style that he would send Ashok Chavan to jail “within six months” should he become the prime minister. In the run-up to Modi’s battle for the third term, Chavan’s name has figured in the Adarsh Scam in the ‘White Paper’ presented by the Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman early this month.
Ashok Chavan recently dumped the Congress and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party. But, as per the policy to first accuse an opponent with charges of corruption and then bring him into the party’s ‘washing machine’—that has become a hallmark of the Modi-Amit Shah’s brand of politics—the BJP has nominated Chavan for the Rajya Sabha polls.
The Rashtriya Janata Dal president, Lalu Prasad Yadav, and now his son, Tejashwi Yadav are, perhaps, the most valiant fighters against the BJP’s “accuse and appropriate” policy. The nomination of Manoj Jha for the second term and Sanjay Yadav, political secretary to Tejashwi, is a clear testimony to the RJD’s non-compromising attitude against Modi-Shah’s regime.
Manoj Jha, a professor of Social Work at Delhi University who was among over 145 MPs suspended from the Parliament has been an ardent advocate of Social Justice and secularism and the most vocal critic of the Prime Minister and the Union Home Minister’s policies and politics.
Sanjay Yadav (40) an M.SC in Computer Science from Bhopal University and Management graduate from Indraprastha University befriended Tejashwi when the latter was a player at the IPL’s Delhi Daredevil team of cricket. Sanjay joined Tejashwi when the latter began working for his party in 2011. He is believed to have worked diligently to make over the image of the party from an “archetypal political outfit” to a “modern one”, making it amenable to technological and social changes. Sanjay, who prefers to keep a low profile, away from the media glare, is said to be the man behind the robust presence of the RJD on social media.
In a way, the RJD looks far ahead and more forward-looking even in comparison to Akhilesh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party in neighboring Uttar Pradesh. By nominating, the former Bollywood actor, Jaya Bachchan, wife of the iconic thespian Amitabh Bacchan in the background of the latter attending the consecration ceremony at the under-construction Ram temple at Ayodhya, appears incongruous with the Opposition’s “will” to fight the BJP. The Samajwadi party leaders, Pallavi Patel and Swamiprasad Maurya have openly opposed Jaya’s nomination.
But then, Ahilesh Yadav is believed to have followed the politics of his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav who kept his “personal friendship” separate from his political consideration. Mulayam Singh had nominated the Hindutva leader, Sakshi Maharaj to the Rajya Sabha during his time. It was Mulayam who brought Jaya to the SP, which Akhilesh is continuing with.
Uncompromising Lalu, Tejashwi
In sharp contrast, Lalu never accommodated his “personal friends” from the Hindutva party in his party’s political space – be it in the era of L. K Advani-A.B Vajpayee or that of Modi-Shah.
Lalu who was himself a harbinger of generational change in Socialist politics in the post-Karpoori Thakur era, produced and promoted new leadership in the undivided Janata Dal in the early 1990s. Ramkripal Yadav (a Union minister now), Jayaprakash Yadav, former MP from Banka, Samrat Choudhary (now in the BJP and Bihar deputy CM), Bhagwati Devi, a woman fighter of the era of Ram Manohar Lohia and her family members who had been relegated to political periphery and many others were “products” of Lalu’s experiment with the youths of his time.
In many ways, Tejashwi has followed up on his father by filling his party with several young but talented youngsters. Recently, the party appointed three scholars from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jayant Jigyasu, Priyanka Bharti and Kanchana Yadav as its national spokespersons who are diligently articulating the party’s lines and philosophy in the media. Another professor at Delhi University, Nawal Kishore has played a pivotal role in grooming the youngsters in the educational campuses of the national capital.
JDU-BJP’s nominees
Unlike the RJD encouraging new leadership, the ruling Janata Dal (United) and the BJP have adopted a very different yardstick in making nominations to the Upper House. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has “rewarded” Sanjay Jha who was said to be a ‘key link’ in his (Nitish’s) switchover from the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) to the BJP. Jha was previously in the BJP, working as a private secretary to the party MP, Rajiv Pratap Rudi and was believed to be close to Arun Jaitely. After joining the JDU, he was said to have his close links with the BJP’s top brass alive. He was said to have played the ‘key link’ between Nitish and the BJP when the CM had switched over to the BJP in 2017 also. He is, apparently, the “best suited” for Nitish’s politics of “flip-flops”.
And in keeping with Modi-Shah’s ‘penchant’ to promote their own brand of ‘loyalists’, the BJP has left out Sushil Kumar Modi—a highly respected and most articulate face of the Sangh Parivar from the Vajpayee-Advani era–and preferred Dharmsheela Gupta and Bhim Singh for the Rajya Sabha. But then Bhim Singh too learnt the ropes of politics in Lalu’s school of ‘Social Justice’ in 1990’s.
The Congress which has 19 MLAs in the Bihar assembly and is dependent on the RJD and the Left to ensure the victory of its nominee, has decided to repeat the Bihar Pradesh Congress committee chief and former Union Minister, Akhilesh Singh in the Rajya Sabha. Akhilesh too was blooded in politics by Lalu and was the RJD MP from Motihari Lok Sabha seat in 2004.
Akhilesh has worked diligently as the BPCC chief as he managed to keep his flock together in the face of the BJP-JDU’s reported efforts to split the Congress when Nitish switched over to the BJP recently.
Nalin Verma is a senior journalist, author, media educator, and independent researcher in folklore.
