As his 16-day “Voter Adhikar Yatra”, which traversed 1,300 kms through 25 of 38 districts of Bihar, ended on September 1, Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, addressing a gathering in Patna, raised a slogan, “vote chor, gaddi chhodh (vote thieves, vacate the throne)”, with the crowd echoing it enthusiastically. “Ye naara chal gaya hai (this slogan has become popular),” said Rahul.
In his speech at this event, RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, who along with some other Mahagathbandhan allies participated in Rahul’s march since its start from Sasaram on September 17, said: “People ask how we will keep our momentum after the Yatra… they must not worry as we are working on it.”
The Yatra criss-crossing over 100 of the state’s 243 Assembly constituencies seems to have given a fillip to the RJD-led Opposition alliance’s standing ahead of the Bihar elections due in November this year. Here are its five takeaways.
Congress visibility
The Congress had gone into political wilderness in Bihar in 1990, when it lost power to the then Lalu Prasad-led Janata Dal. In the 2000 Assembly polls, the Congress got just 23 seats. Later, the party joined an alliance with Lalu-led RJD.
The grand old party improved its performance in the 2015 polls when JD(U) supremo and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar joined the Mahagathbandhan. Gaining from “convertibility” of votes then, the Congress bagged 27 seats.
However, in the 2020 polls, when Nitish had returned to the NDA, the Congress managed to win just 19 of 70 seats it contested, even as its senior ally RJD finished as the single largest party with 75 seats. The NDA returned to power by getting 125 seats as against the Mahagathbandhan’s 110, with the latter’s narrow defeat widely attributed to the Congress’s poor strike rate.
Before Rahul launched his Voter Adhikar Yatra, the Congress was dubbed as the Mahagathbandhan’s “weak link”. But, with the march drawing massive crowds across the state, the Congress gained traction as it was mainly the party’s show led by Rahul.
With incumbent CM Nitish Kumar grappling with health issues, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to spearhead the NDA’s electioneering in the Bihar polls. RJD would thus be more dependent on Rahul to provide a national counter to the PM Modi’s campaign.
The Congress also seemed to have gained ground in several Muslim-dominated constituencies including the RJD’s strongholds such as Darbhanga, Madhubani and Araria. The Congress’s decline in the state began after its alleged failings in tackling the 1989 Bhagalpur riots that led to a large section of Muslim voters switching their allegiance to the Janata Dal and later, to the RJD. After taking charge as the CM for his first term in 1990, Lalu went on to become the key leader of the minority community in the state.
Tejashwi rise
During his entire Yatra, Rahul was flanked by Tejashwi, the LoP in the Bihar Assembly, which put him in the national spotlight, even as he also reinforced his position as the Mahagathbandhan’s CM face, albeit undeclared, for the polls.
Although Rahul, in Araria during the Yatra, ducked a reporter’s question about Tejashwi’s chief ministerial candidature, Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav, who joined the Yatra in its Ara leg on August 30, called for “lending support to Tejashwi” for shaping new Bihar.
Subsequently, Tejashwi also projected himself, in the Ara and Patna legs of the Yatra, as the Opposition alliance’s CM candidate by asking the crowds if they wanted “original or duplicate CM”, taking a swipe at Nitish for being a “duplicate CM” for allegedly “copying” his various proposed welfare schemes including enhanced social security pension, free electricity and a youth commission.
INDIA bloc unity
Rahul undertook the Yatra to amplify his “vote chori” allegations in various elections against the ruling BJP and the Election Commission (EC) and oppose the EC’s ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar.
The SIR plank united the entire Opposition INDIA bloc, which was seen during the entire Yatra as it was periodically joined by a slew of the alliance’s faces ranging from DMK supremo and Tamil Nadu CM M K Stalin to Akhilesh and JMM chief and Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, to the TMC’s Yusuf Pathan and the Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Raut.
Pappu Yadav factor
In the wake of the Yatra, the Mahagathbandhan has now got Independent MP from Purnea, Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, on board, who despite being associated with the Congress had bad blood with the RJD.
Pappu Yadav has his influence over nearly 15 seats including Supaul, Madhepura, Saharsa, Araria and Purnia in the Kosi-Seemanchal region.
Pappu had merged his Jan Adhikar Party with the Congress before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls but had to contest as a rebel from Purnea after the party denied him a ticket under the RJD’s pressure. He still managed to bag the seat by defeating incumbent JD (U) MP Santosh Kushwaha with the RJD nominee Bima Bharti finishing at third place.
Tejashwi warmed up to Pappu during the Yatra, who, in turn, called him “Jannayak” in Rahul’s presence. This may lead to the Congress bargaining for some more seats with the RJD in the Seemanchal region for the upcoming polls.
Pressure on NDA
The Yatra seems to have cornered the NDA, which is set to redraw its strategies. Despite being publicly dismissive about the march, several JD (U) and BJP leaders concede that it has boosted the Mahagathbandhan’s prospects and managed to create a perception among some quarters about alleged electoral irregularities.
RJD MP and national spokesperson Manoj Kumar Jha told The Indian Express: “The Yatra is over, messaging is not. The traction the Yatra got over a fortnight would create its own events.”
State Congress spokesperson Prem Chandra Mishra said: “Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC) has held a meeting to discuss what we should do next to keep our momentum going. Our booth level workers would take up the issues of aggrieved voters with respective BLOs (block level officers) during the entire SIR exercise.”
The NDA targeted Rahul, with the BJP’s Patna Sahib MP and ex-Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad saying “It was the same Rahul Gandhi who had opened ‘mohabbat ki dukaan’ during the last Lok Sabha poll campaign. What happened? In Voter Adhikar Yatra, he kept himself at the forefront as if he were the Mahagathbandhan CM candidate. When 99% voters had filled up their forms, SIR is a non-issue. They should have rather condemned the Darbhanga incident during which a person had used foul language against the PM’s mother.”
JD (U) national spokesperson Rajiv Ranjan Prasad said: “NDA leaders have moved around 120 Assembly segments. We don’t sense any impact of SIR on the ground. In fact, the Opposition failed to make most of the opportunities it had for taking up problems of aggrieved voters. Rather, Voter Adhikar Yatra might cause fissures in Mahagathbandhan in coming days as Congress has tried to dominate RJD in the process.”
