Bihar Maha Bitterness: Why Board And Then Blame The Sinking Ship! Skip to main content

Bihar Maha Bitterness: Why Board And Then Blame The Sinking Ship!

 


After riding on a palpable anti-incumbency wave and the predictions of clear victory by all of the exit polls the ultimate narrow defeat of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)-led Mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance) in the Bihar Assembly Elections-2020 is bound to cause huge disappointment and bitterness. Unable to accept defeat the leaders of the RJD first started attacking the Election Commission on a variety of alleged anomalies in counting, and then picked out the main alliance partner, the Indian National Congress (INC), for letting them down. A prominent RJD leader attacked Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi for their alleged callousness towards the election. The leader further alleged that they did not come for the election campaigns attending a very few rallies, but were only interested in having picnics. He also questioned the internal management of the INC and its lack of introspection.

 

Having said that, we must examine the underlying factors. The RJD under the leadership of a young and energetic Tejashwi Yadav must have been aware of the anti-incumbency wave and the strong public anger against the serving Chief Minister (CM) Nitish Kumar, and also of the strategic Chirag Paswan factor as a vote-cutter. In that scenario, why at all did Yadav’s party allot as many as 70 seats to the Congress or the INC! They must also have been aware of the Congress track record since 2014. Considering everything the RJD should have fought in at least 200 seats sharing the remaining 43 with its allies, more to the Left parties and the least to the Congress. Once one boards a sinking ship, one loses the right to put the blame on it if it does sink later. Some leaders of the RJD have now realized this mistake and are regretting that they should not have succumbed to the pressure applied by the Congress for a larger seat-share. Therefore, it’s an opportunity lost for the RJD, entirely, and not at all for the Congress that had been used to poor performances. Confined to Tejashwi Yadav Vs Nitish Kumar, majority of the people of Bihar wanted the former to be their CM.

 


Rahul Gandhi, on the other hand, has become a monolith in the INC, nobody can either wish him away or accept him. Thanks to his historical position he has always been the punching bag for all political opponents, analysts and even such unlikely observers as the former US President Obama! As a Youth Congress leader initially, Rahul had been the fresh young face inducted into the Congress party, but unfortunately, he got fossilized in that role over the years/decades. The old guards, scared of being forgotten and desperately clutching at the power stick, surrounded and guided Rahul and his mother and Congress interim President Sonia Gandhi as the staunchest of loyalists, for their mere survival.  

 

With a bright career as a student behind him Rahul had the intelligence to understand the significance of the momentous defeats of 2014 and 2019 in General Elections, and so, he resigned as Congress President in 2019, and was adamant never to assume that role again. The old guards got petrified with fear lest a non-dynastic younger leader got elected for the post. So, they convinced Sonia Gandhi to carry on, and again in 2020 the loyalists persisted on Sonia Gandhi to continue as the interim President of the party.

 

Thanks to the anti-incumbency factors Congress under Rahul did win three assembly elections in 2018, but the old guards insisted on appointing CMs of their ilk in those three states, and definitely not the promising and younger leaders who worked hard for the wins. Due to the cardinal sin of depriving the dynamic Jyotiraditya Scindia of a CM role, the party lost its government in Madhya Pradesh early this year. They nearly lost Rajasthan in July 2020, again thanks to the same myopic vision of not taking the party’s younger leaders into the scheme of things. This has created dissidence in the party structure with leaders like Kapil Sibal, Shashi Tharoor, Manish Tewary and others urging the party to introspect. And, the colossus decided to take punitive action against them, instead of doing the much-needed exercise.

 

Now, the RJD leaders too are trying to sing with the dissident leaders of the Congress. Kapil Sibal has again alleged that the INC has not been introspecting for the last six years which is true indeed. The RJD also did not have much to boast of with the Laloo legacy still staring and not sparing. However, Tejashwi almost came out of that legacy, establishing himself as a leader of much promise, on his own. But miscalculations within his own party prevented him from becoming the youngest CM of the state.

 

Meanwhile, Nitish Kumar was sworn in as CM for the fourth consecutive term yesterday with his party JDU able to secure only the third position. No doubt, he is flanked by two BJP Deputy Chief Ministers. And the inconsolable bitterness of the single largest party continues…

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Mitali: The Trauma of Losing a Sibling

Maybe I lied to her when I used to reassure her that she was going to be alright and was going to resume her life in some measure of normalcy in the future years; maybe all my gestures/expressions were false when I used to run my fingers across her forehead or embrace her on occasions when she was able to move around a bit; and maybe all my exhibitions of love care and responsibility were exposed as superficial when I failed to turn up in Delhi where she along with my mother were treated during September-October, 2022 (my mother Urmila Chakravarty was also diagnosed with dental cancer the same month the same year as she was) and when all the members of my parental family and the in-laws converged. Since that fateful day in August, 2022 when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer to that disastrous day of March 6, 2025—the day my younger blood sister Mitali (Mainu) Chakravarty Sarma (November 2, 1963—March 6, 2025) passed away in the wee hours in a hospital in Guwahati after giving a bra...

Release of Book 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories'!

The fourth collection of stories titled 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories' by Chinmay Chakravarty has been released on Amazon KDP just now! This collection, short stories in a lighter vein plus with mild satire like the previous collections, has been published in both the E-book and Paperback formats. The links are given below:  International: Click Here ! India: Click Here !  Other collections of short stories by the same author: The Cheerless Chauffeur and Other Tales(2021)--Notion Press. Funny and Fishy Tales(2022)--KDP. The Weirdos(2022)--Ukiyoto Publishing. All books of the author are available on Goodreads, apart from Amazon and other outlets! Have a look!

Kolkata: Cancel the Commerce of the Durga Puja Carnival!

Yes! We ask why shouldn't the pure Commerce show of the Durga Puja Carnival in Kolkata be canceled in view of the worsening medical crisis? For how long this cruel irony of continuing the worship of the Mother Goddess and continuing to torture/kill the Mothers in human forms going to continue?  Greed, limitless greed of humans! Dear God! This time Goddess Durga came in a cradle which in itself implies ominous times, and further, the tithis from Mahasaptami onward came mixed in such a way that you get three days of worship, technically. Yet, the greedy and selfie-social-media-crazy crowds of 'devotees' were still not satiated, descending on the Puja pandals in uncontrollable hordes for as long as seven days, and to pander to their greed and to have the maximum of business, most of the Puja organizers disregarded the tithi break-up completely and have been celebrating Bijoya Dashami or the Dussehra well into Ekadashi, the eleventh day! They expect the hordes to descend tonigh...