Rise of new JMM face: First-time minister Basant Soren set to lead party in LS polls with brother Hemant in jail

The youngest son of JMM supremo Shibu Soren, Basant Soren, 44, heads the party’s youth wing. His political innings began in Dumka when elder brother Hemant fought from there in the state’s first ever Assembly elections in 2005. Hemant lost, but Basant, who was involved in his campaign, learnt his lessons. He, though, had to wait till the 2016 Rajya Sabha elections for his first brush with electoral politics, when he lost by a whisker to the BJP’s Mahesh Poddar.

Basant entered the state Assembly in 2020 by winning a bypoll from Dumka, which Hemant had vacated, having also won from Barhait in the December 2019 Assembly polls. During the Covid-19 second wave, he is said to have visited his constituency frequently and helped with the vaccination efforts. A district administration source later said, “Among tribals, there was a lot of hesitancy about vaccines. To combat this, we conducted camps and Basant Soren helped us make people understand the importance of vaccines. From the MLA funds, he also helped us buy two ambulances that were deployed in a few blocks.”

It was during the tense Madhupur by-election in April 2021, though, when Basant made his mark. The bypoll was necessitated by the death of the JMM’s Haji Hussain Ansari in September 2020 due to Covid-19. The Mahagathbandhan fielded Ansari’s son Hafizul Hassan, who was already a minister. But the campaign was led by Basant, and political observers said it was an exam of his political ability.

Having suffered two bypoll losses in Dumka and Bermo since losing the 2019 Assembly elections, the BJP was desperate to win Madhupur, and deployed heavyweights such as former CMs Babulal Marandi and Raghubar Das, Rajya Sabha MP Deepak Prakash and Godda MP Nishikant Dubey to campaign for their candidate, Ganga Narayan.

After Hassan won the contest, a senior MLA who was part of Basant’s campaign team, said, “He (Basant) spoke in the Santhali language and asked the electorate to fight for what his father, Shibu Soren, had achieved. His Santhali oratory is excellent. Only his elder brother Hemant and party senior Champai Soren speak the language better than him.”

Even though Basant has got increasingly drawn into party activities since then — for which he began spending more time in Bokaro and Ranchi — his work as MLA in Dumka has continued, including the sanctioning of various projects. These include a mini secretariat in Dumka — which is currently in progress, and an irrigation barrage over the Nunbil river in Masaliya block — for which several hundred crores has been sanctioned.

The JMM functionaries, while claiming that Basant gets preference over other legislators “as he is the son of Guruji (Shibu Soren)”, said he is yet to fully mature. A few also complained of his short temper. In January 2021, miffed by repeated complaints against block-level officers, Basant said at a public event in Dumka, in Hindi, “It is unfortunate that even after your son is at the helm, you say that the BDO (Block Development Officer) or the CO (Circle Officer) don’t listen to you. It is unfortunate that you are not able to throw shoes and slippers (at them).”

The then CM Hemant, who was present at the event, had defended his brother in public, but insiders said Basant was rebuked behind closed doors, told to cap his speeches in Hindi and keep his temper in check.

Basant came into the BJP’s crosshairs in 2022, when the state opposition party alleged that the Dumka MLA had failed to disclose crucial information in his poll affidavit, and had continued engaging in his private business, using his influence to obtain mining and other business rights. The case, which was referred to the ECI by Governor Ramesh Bais, was eventually rejected by the poll panel.