Patna,(BiharTimes): As he was the first and longest-serving chief minister of Bihar there is nothing wrong in celebrating the birth anniversary of Shri Krishna Singh. But when the political parties indulge in any such exercise it is bound to have its objective. The BJP organized one such function on October 20, apparently to pay tributes to him, but actually to woo or keep intact its hold over the Bhumihar votebank.
It is other thing that the move did not yield desired result as the leaders of this caste such as Bhola Singh, MP from Begusarai and Chandra Mohan Rai, former minister, chose to directly question the very leadership of Sushil Kumar Modi. The latter in fact invited the Minister of State for Railways, Manoj Sinha, a Bhumihar from East Uttar Pradesh to this function at S K Memorial Hall, as there is no minister of this caste in the Union cabinet. This in itself is something surprising as never before the Bhumihar interest has been ignored so much by the party on which the caste has reposed so much faith.
But it is not just the BJP which commemorated the 127th birth anniversary of Shri Babu. The leaders of grand alliance––Congress leader and former Union minister, Akhilesh Singh and the JD((U) minister Mahachandra Prasad Singh––organized one such show in Patna. Though former chief minister did not turn up, though he was supposed to inaugurate it, the chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi did come.
Nitish flew to Delhi to attend another such function organized by his party.
The big question is: why all these parties are so much interested in paying tributes to Shri Babu?
The reason is obvious: all the major parties have their eyes on the Bhumihar votes, as the caste is politically, socially, educationally and economically dominant. It has strong presence in both the urban and rural areas and has the capability to swing votes one way or the other.
A political commentator belonging to this caste told BiharTimes: “After the creation of Jharkhand the percentage of Bhumihars have certainly gone up. But the percentage may still be too small to make any party or alliance; however it is still substantial to influence and mar the prospect of any party or individual.”
In spite of all these qualities Bihar has not seen any Bhumihar CM since Shri Babu, though leader belonging to all castes, even Mahadalit and Muslim, have come to hold this post.
Bhumihars have the knack to manipulate things in their favour. Even during the post-Mandal years of politics some Bhumihars had a very good equation with none else but Mandal-Messiah, Lalu Prasad.
So there is nothing to be surprised if parties organize the birth anniversary of Shri Babu. The BJP has every reason to feel worried. The rank and file of the party are quite perturbed over the non-inclusion of any Bhumihar in the Union cabinet from Bihar. In contrast Narendra Modi inducted Radha Mohan Singh, a Rajput, and made him agriculture minister.
In private the anger of Bhumihars is directed against Narendra Modi. But as neither Dr C P Thakur nor Bhola Singh, Chandra Mohan Rai or even Giriraj Singh, can dare to say anything against the Prime Minister they have soft option in the form of Sushil Kumar Modi, who his critics say is an over-ambitious politician.
Bhumihar are well-adepted in playing power politics and it has its option in the form of Janata Dal (United). After all till a few months back: Kurmi Ko Taj aur Bhumihar Ka Raj (Crown to Kurmi but the actual rule of Bhumihar), was the common refrain doing the rounds in the corridors of power.
The recent by election for 10 seats in which the grand alliance won six clearly showed that Bhumihars are not fully inclined towards the BJP. Two of the six winning candidates of the grand alliance parties were Bhumihars and they won by huge margins.
Bhumihars have now adopted wait and watch approach. If there is no casteman in the Union cabinet, can not one of its leader be projected as the chief ministerial candidate by the saffron party?