Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar (file photo)Lalu Prasad is amused at the bustle of his new political partner Nitish Kumar. Apart from becoming chief minister of Bihar for a third term in alliance with Lalu's Rashtriya Janata Dal, Nitish sprang a surprise by persuading Sharad Yadav to give up presidentship of Janata Dal (united). The chief minister consolidated his power by getting elected as the president.
Now Nitish, who has fought bitter political battles with Narendra Modi in the last three years, wants to consolidate the splintered Janata Parivar as a fighting force in north India to take on the BJP, which had swept the Lok Sabha elections in the Hindi heartland.
The chief minister, who is dependent on the RJD for survival in Bihar assembly, thinks he can repeat the Mahagaibhandan (grand alliance) experiment, which succeeded in Bihar by bringing Janata Dal(united), RJD and Congress during assembly elections. The hastily formed alliance routed an overconfident Modi, who suffered a humiliating defeat in 2015 compared to the Modi wave, which swept Bihar just a year earlier. Nitish, who had built his political persona by opposing Lalu's jungle raj for two decades, had to accommodate the former's two sons in the cabinet. But he has been hailed as a man who can produce election victories with allies from opposite poles - like BJP for two elections and now with RJD and Congress.
But the chief minister wants the presence of JD(U) to expand to more states. Apart from Bihar, the party has presence in Kerala as part of United Democratic Front; while in Karnataka, bulk of the Janata Parivar are with Janata Dal (socialist) of H.D. Deve Gowda. Many others have switched over to either Congress (like Siddaramaiah group) or to BJP (Basavaaj Bommai group). But Nitish's political advisor Prashant Kishor, who is credited with the concept of grand alliance, feels the influence of Nitish outside Bihar, especially in nieghbouring states of Jharkand, Uttar Pradesh and even in Rajasthan and Haryana has not been realised. Hence, he persuaded Nitish to approach smaller fragments such as Rashtriya Lok Dal of Ajit Singh in Uttar Pradesh and Jharkand Vikas Morcha of former chief minister Babulal Marandi.
Ajit Singh, whose influence is confined to western Maharashtra, at present has no MPs, but in the last Lok Sabha, there were five RLD MPs. Marandi had lone representation in Lok Sabha till he was swept by the Modi wave. Both these parties, along with the Samajwadi Janata Party founded by former prime minister Chandra Shekhar will merge with Janata Dal (united) in a few days time. The SJP is controlled by Mumbai businessman Kamal Morarka and has no political presence. Even Chandra Shekar's son Neeraj Shekhar, who had influences in Ballia constituency of Uttar Pradesh, has joined Samajwadi party.
The big players of the erstwhile Janata Parivar have no intentions of hitching to the bandwagon of Nitish. While Lalu is working hard to make his party grow back to dominance in Bihar at the expense of Janata Dal (united), Mulayam Singh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh or Naveen Patnaik of Biju Janata Dal in Odisha and Deve Gowda of Janata Dal(s) in Karnataka, who had been part of Janata Dal headed by V.P. Singh, have no intention of giving up their separate identity; they would also not be ordinarily entering into pre electoral arrangements with Nitish. Even in Uttar Pradesh, Mulayam Singh Yadav has said that if Ajit Singh wants his support, then he and his supporters should content on the bicycle symbol of Samajwadi Party.
But Nitish and Kishor are optimists: they feel Janata Dal (united) would attract smaller parties such as Lok Janshakti of Ram Vilas Paswan, Apna Dal in Uttar Pradesh into the JD(U) fold. They have also sent feelers to Indian National Lok Dal in Haryana whose supreme leader Om Prakash Chautala is in prison after conviction in a corruption case. Nitish is a patient plotter whose ambition is to pull the rug from under Modi's feet. But he has a tough job in trying to persuade the big leaders of Janata Parivar who have both big support bases and big egos.
