Bihar caught between caste and conflict

AMONG the states in the vast swathe of the Hindi heartland, Bihar has a distinctive place. It has generally foregrounded caste over nationalism and communalism in an election unless large sections of the electorate succumb to a polarising narrative; it was the spearhead of powerful anti- establishment movements; and it was the first north Indian state to recognise and acknowledge women as a vote block unto themselves and not as an appendage to males.

Six or seven months hence, Bihar will hold an Assembly election which will test the BJP’s ability and skill to pull off a victory based on the alchemy of its brand of nationalism, Hindutva and caste. Until last week, the BJP seemed confident that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was enough to knit together the myriad disparate castes, including those wedded to the Opposition parties, into a revenge-thirsting cohort against the “enemy" on the western border.

In his first speech after the killing and wounding of families holidaying in Pahalgam, unarmed and defenceless, by Pakistan-trained militants, Modi switched to English to beam a global message but packaged with implications for Bihar. “Today from the soil of Bihar, I say to the whole world, India will identify, track and punish every terrorist and their backers. We will pursue them to the ends of the Earth," he proclaimed.

By then, the ‘Pakistani hand’ in the ghastly strike was increasingly apparent. The crowd roared in frenzy as Modi’s address became more bellicose. The politicised Bihar, always quick to catch the context and nuances in a leader’s speech, realised that the word from Madhubani, a town in the central region, was fraught with big meaning.

Days later, something of greater import to the people of Bihar, that had been hanging in the air, competed for first place with Pakistan. On April 30, the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs green-signalled the inclusion of caste enumeration in the impending population census.

Caste enumeration was a long-pending demand of the Congress-led India bloc. It had deployed the issue in its campaign in the 2024 General Elections. It could not convert its rhetoric into votes, mainly because the present-day Congress inherited a dubious legacy on the Mandal Commission’s recommendations. The commission proposed reservation in educational institutions and government jobs for the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) that was further divided into the More Backward Classes and Extremely Backward Classes, conditioned by their economic and social status in the hierarchy.

The Congress’ historical allegiance to the upper castes — who it considered as its core political sustenance in north India — led to a marked reluctance on its part to embrace the Mandal report when the then PM, VP Singh of the Janata Dal, announced the government’s intent to implement the OBC quota.

In the late 1980s, the BJP started making an impact in the west and north, but after clutching on to Hindutva via Ram. Unlike the Congress, the BJP brain trust, with former general secretary KN Govindacharya at the nucleus, pressed LK Advani and the other leaders to endorse Mandal if they wished to occupy a pole position in the heartland in the near future.

Advani readily agreed and, thus, began the BJP’s long journey towards fashioning a formula where it ensured that the upper castes could co-exist with the OBCs, although the fault lines surfaced periodically.

The BJP’s adoption of Mandal in its political scheme also nurtured a line of successful OBC netas, a process that culminated in the anointment of Modi as the PM.

The BJP’s tryst with Mandal wasn’t especially productive in Bihar. It had to seek the hands of some socialist factions to transcend its Brahmin-Bhumihar-Rajput support. Through parties like the defunct Samata Party and, now, the Janata Dal (United) and the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas Paswan), it secured the votes of OBCs and Dalits.

But the BJP’s tenure at the Centre and the clever use of central resources — the recent Union Budget referenced Bihar — and its strategic cultivation of the MBCs, EBCs and some Dalit sub-castes have given it an upper hand in the NDA, although it was made clear that CM Nitish Kumar would lead the coalition in the polls. The tables seem to have turned in the BJP’s favour.

What of Modi’s emphasis on the Pakistan assault and the threat of war? Will nationalism, purveyed in his words spoken at Madhubani, take second place after caste?

In 2019, the attack on security forces in Pulwama — for which the Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistan-based terrorist group claimed responsibility — and India’s subsequent air strikes on a JeM camp deep inside Pakistan yielded a moderate success for the BJP-led NDA in Bihar in the Lok Sabha election. The alliance won 29 of the 40 seats. The 2020 Assembly elections brought victory to the NDA — 125 of the 243 seats — although the Rashtriya Janata Dal emerged as the single largest party. Pakistan fed the RSS-BJP’s narrative of Hindu-Muslim enmity, kindled by memories of the previous wars and Partition.

The effect of cross-border conflicts has been mixed in Bihar. In 2000, a year after the Kargil limited war, the outcome in the legislative election was fractured. In a close contest, the RJD, led by Lalu Prasad Yadav, came out as the single largest party with 124 but could not hit the majority mark. The BJP stood at a poor second spot, with just 67 seats.

Bihar’s Opposition was expectedly muted on the Pahalgam killings. The normally combative RJD leader, Tejaswi Yadav, alleged it was an intelligence failure and demanded a special Parliament session to discuss the tragedy.

Perhaps, the Centre’s move to conduct a caste census could help the opposition Mahagathbandhan to score a brownie point over the BJP since Rahul Gandhi and his allies had flagged the subject quite a while ago.

The fact that the BJP responded, albeit belatedly, showed that it was prepared to guard its flanks, regardless of the repercussions.

Radhika Ramaseshan is a senior journalist.

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