The Saffron Machinery has been at work to grab Mukesh Sahani’s ‘Mallah’ Vote-Base using munificent doles for quite some  time .

The Bharatiya Janata Party has swallowed the state Animal Husbandry Minister Mukesh Sahani’s Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP)—a component of Nitish Kumar led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in Bihar—with all the three of its MLAs merging in to the saffron outfit.

The MLAs—Rajkumar Singh (Sahebganj), Misrilal Yadav (Alinagar) and Swarna Singh (Gaura Bauram)— met the Bihar Assembly speaker, Vijay Kumar Sinha—a BJP MLA and ‘pick’ of Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duo—on Tuesday resigning from the VIP and requesting their merger with the BJP which Sinha immediately accepted.

Mukesh Sahni left his Bollywood business in Mumbai about a decade ago and joined the hurly burly of politics in Bihar—he banked on the support of Mallahs (boatmen) –an extremely backward class (EBC)—which are in sizeable number in about a dozen of the assembly constituencies of Mithila and Tirhut regions in north of the Ganga.

Sahni in the beginning had dallied in alliances   with Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad Yadav. On the eve of the 2020 assembly polls his party (VIP) became a part of the NDA, getting 11 seats to contest . His candidates bagged four seats but Mukesh himself lost. Subsequently he became a Member of the Legislative Council (MLC) and a minister in the Nitish government.

But the BJP saw to it that he was made MLC on a seat , which had its tenure ending in July this year. Now, Mukesh will cease to be an MLC too in July and in the process, lose his ministerial position too. While Sahani has, for all practical purposes, lost his political power, the BJP has strengthened  itself as the single largest party in Bihar House—it has now 77 MLAs against the Rastriya Janata Dal’s 75.

Larger Game:

Mukesh Sahani is a victim of the larger game that the BJP is playing in what the Planning Commission (before its demise) described ‘bimaru (ill)’ states—Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya  Pradesh and Rajasthan. Inhabited by a very large poor population—mostly belonging to the OBCs and the EBCs—these states have served as the RSS-BJP’s  ‘laboratory’ to consolidate its votes using the Hindutva ideology woven  into welfare schemes. Using the dole of Rs 6000 per year in three instalments in the name of Kisan Samman Rashi (KSR) with the sanction of Rs 56000 crore in the union budget ahead of the elections in five states besides free ration, houses and toilets, the BJP has  made inroads into the heart of the vast swathe of population—mostly poor belong to the OBC and EBCs— promising to end poverty . In the process,  the saffron party has broken the clout that leaders of smaller caste parties held over their respective communities.

The phenomena manifested in the recently concluded U.P elections with the Samajvadi Party getting several smaller castes leaders into its fold but their respective caste-men largely staying with the BJP on the plea “Modi baitha kar khila raha hai (Modi is feeding us without taking any work from us)”. The voters complained about the price rise, unemployment, shortage of oxygen and beds during pandemic and menace of awaara pashu (stray cattle), still they largely stuck with the BJP. Obviously, the doles supported by the union budget and directly transferred to the beneficiaries’ account,weighed over the issues of price rise, unemployment, economic distress and shoddy governance.

Mukesh’s Misadventure:

Mukesh fielded his candidates in over 50 assembly constituencies in Uttar Pradesh and went all out attacking the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi and U.P chief minister, Yogi Adityanath. The BJP was not happy because he was a minister in Bihar’s NDA government. But Sahani took the alibi of Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) which too had fielded its candidates separately in U.P. In a way, Mukesh failed to measure that Nitish—despite his weaknesses—carried more political weight before the BJP than he did.

In the meantime the assembly seat of Bochaha—which had elected Musafir Paswan of the VIP—fell vacant in the wake of Musafir’s death. Logically, the VIP had its claim to the seat scheduled for by-elections next month. But the BJP grabbed the seat, fielding its own candidate. As of now, Mukesh is mulling over the idea of fielding his own candidate from Bochaha. The RJD which has fielded Musafir’s son in the seat will make all  efforts to wrest it from the BJP.

In the given situation it is going to be a long haul for Mukesh Sahani. At this stage he has lost whatever he had. “NDA mein jaana mera bara bhool thaa (Joining the NDA was my biggest mistake). The people of Bochaha (read Mallahs) will answer to the BJP”, Sahani said. But will his caste-men avenge the humiliation meted out to their caste leader or will they stick to the BJP that is feeding them with the munificent doles? The by-election result of Bochaha will answer this question.