Vijaya Pushkarna / The Week
Nitish was Bihar’s original development man, a son of the soil, and the lone person who dared to take on Modi. Also, Bihar is the first state that is going to the polls after the BJP was humbled—nay humiliated—in Delhi. With just three out of 70 assembly seats in the BJP’s kitty, the joke in the capital was that its elected leaders needed no more than an auto-rickshaw to reach the Delhi Vidhan Sabha. The BJP may not say so, but Bihar has become the battleground for Modi’s swabhiman as much as Nitish’s.
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Bihar could be a game changer for Modi. If the BJP loses, it could have an impact on the party’s chances when elections are held in Punjab in 2016 and Uttar Pradesh in 2017. More action would follow in 2018 when elections to the assemblies of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, all BJP-ruled states with different levels of anti-incumbency, would be held. BJP president Amit Shah, who has the reputation of being a strategist, is closely monitoring the developments and has his trusted people from all over the country in Bihar right now. Any upset here would put a question mark on his skills. It could also spoil the BJP’s chances of winning a second term for Modi.
Nitish was Bihar’s original development man, a son of the soil, and the lone person who dared to take on Modi. Also, Bihar is the first state that is going to the polls after the BJP was humbled—nay humiliated—in Delhi. With just three out of 70 assembly seats in the BJP’s kitty, the joke in the capital was that its elected leaders needed no more than an auto-rickshaw to reach the Delhi Vidhan Sabha. The BJP may not say so, but Bihar has become the battleground for Modi’s swabhiman as much as Nitish’s.
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Bihar could be a game changer for Modi. If the BJP loses, it could have an impact on the party’s chances when elections are held in Punjab in 2016 and Uttar Pradesh in 2017. More action would follow in 2018 when elections to the assemblies of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, all BJP-ruled states with different levels of anti-incumbency, would be held. BJP president Amit Shah, who has the reputation of being a strategist, is closely monitoring the developments and has his trusted people from all over the country in Bihar right now. Any upset here would put a question mark on his skills. It could also spoil the BJP’s chances of winning a second term for Modi.
While Narendra Modi has been unsparing in his criticism of Nitish Kumar, the latter's responses have been short, though not sweet. One such retort was: “The PM comes from a manufacturing state, lots of it could be data. So, he is manufacturing data.” Brevity, after all, is the soul of wit. more
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