Bihar: Nitish’s facesaver

The victory of the Mahagathbandhan in Bihar Assembly elections is certainly remarkable. However, some analysts had gone overboard by attributing its victory not to party or caste combinations but only to Nitish Kumar’s good governance and affable personality. A deeper insight into the performance of the two alliances and the reasons attributed for the outcome of elections would throw some interesting facts and the way forward for Janata Dal (United)-Rashtriya Janata Dal government in the next five years.

In the Bihar Assembly elections, the National Democratic Alliance and Mahagathbandhan got about 34.1 per cent and 41.9 per cent votes, respectively with a gap of 7.8 per cent. In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the National Democratic Alliance and the constituents of what’s now the Mahagathbandhan got about 39.5 per cent votes and 45.1 per cent, respectively with a gap of 5.6 per cent. The NDA and Mahagathbandhan lost 5.4 per cent and 3.2 per cent respectively, thereby the gap between the alliances widened to 7.8 per cent in 2015.

Had the NDA managed to retain its Lok Sabha performance and Mahagathbandhan got its arithmetic intact, the NDA would still have lost the elections, albeit in a more dignified way.

How far it is right to attribute the victory of the Mahagathbandhan to Mr Kumar and his good governance Let us explore. Whenever an alliance contest an election, the strike rate of the political parties depends on various factors. One significant factor is the popularity and good image of the leader as indicated in the past election results of alliances. If we look at the Mahagathbandhan’s performance in Bihar, for the same number of 101 seats that it contested, Janata Dal (United) won 71 seats with 16.8 per cent vote share, whereas, the Rashtriya Janata Dal won 80 seats with 18.4 per cent and out of 40 seats it contested, the Congress won 27 seats with 6.7 per cent vote share. For the seats the parties of Mahagathbandhan contested, the ideal vote share for JD(U), RJD and Congress should have been 17.4 per cent, 17.4 per cent and 7.1 per cent respectively.

The true strength of different political parties are known only when they contest alone and the 2014 Lok Sabha election result for Bihar is testimony to that. In 2014, the BJP moved to first place with 29.9 per cent vote share from the third position it occupied earlier pushing aside the RJD and JD(U) to the second and third place with 20.5 per cent and 16 per cent vote share respectively. From these results and otherwise also, Mr Kumar knew his limited party base and popularity and that is why he accepted sharing equal number of seats for contesting with Lalu Prasad Yadav in 2015 Assembly elections, unlike the previous elections where the JD(U) was a big brother in the NDA.

Mr Yadav’s ability to keep his vote share intact and transfer it to the alliance partners contributed more for the victory of Mahagathbandhan than the image of Mr Kumar and his government. Had the RJD and JD(U) shared the seats in accordance with the votes they got in 2014 elections, Mahagathbandhan would have got a much bigger victory, as the strike rate of the RJD is higher than that of the JD(U). Had his governance created such a goodwill in the minds of voters in Bihar, his party could have emerged as the single largest party, notwithstanding the fact that Bihar is still a caste-ridden state. In this backdrop, the claim that the victory is for Mr Kumar and his persona does not hold water.

Although the BJP lost about five per cent of its vote share in 2015 Assembly elections, it retained its numero uno position. On the other hand, although, Mr Kumar became chief minister for the third consecutive time, he had to do this by relegating his party to the third position, forfeiting his bargaining power. He now knows that chief ministership resides with him till Mr Yadav wishes. Thus, the negative impact of the break-up of the JD(U)-BJP alliance has been more on the JD(U) than the BJP and the victory of Mr Kumar is pyrrhic in this regard.

The other misrepresentation claimed by some Modi-baiters from the Bihar elections is that Narendra Modi’s model of governance in Gujarat smacked of development of economic sectors at the cost of social sectors, whereas Mr Kumar’s model of governance focused on the development of social sectors and this is how Mr Kumar became the darling of electorate.

During Mr Modi’s tenure as chief minister of Gujarat, Jyotigram provided electricity to villages, investment in electricity grids ensured better electricity supply to various sectors, including agriculture, Kanya Kelavani increased the enrolment of girl children to schools, water supply schemes from Sardar Sarovar Project provided drinking water to villages, the revision of state board syllabus improved the success rate of state board students in IIT-JEE, bus rapid transit for Ahmedabad and other cities, to list a few.

Above all, agriculture witnessed more than 10 per cent yearly growth during Mr Modi’s rule in Gujarat which contributed to the 9 per cent growth rate of Gujarat. Mr Modi concentrated on economic sectors like roads, power generation, development of ports and red carpet for bigger industries as much as social sector development. It is peevish to propagate that economic sector development does not help the common and poor man as much as social sector development. The development of economic and social sector are the two sides of the same coin and overlap significantly.

It is true that Bihar witnessed a growth rate of about 10 per cent with investment in social sectors in the last 10 years. But without enough investment in economic sectors, it is difficult to sustain the growth rate. Bihar witnessed a higher enrolment rate of children in the school in the last 10 years with schemes like free bicycle for girl children. As a result, Bihar will witness a larger number of youth — men and women — who would look for gainful employment in the years to come. Without economic growth, these educated youth will become disgruntled. It is to be seen whether Mr Kumar has understood the changing aspirations of Biharis. The way forward for Mr Kumar ideally should be to contribute to the growth both economic and social sectors in his governance.

The writer is a Ph.D., Public Systems, from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. Views expressed are personal.