Patna: The Bihar Assembly elections 2020 are testing the mettle of the scions of two foremost political dynasties in the state – the Prasads and the Paswans. The two are fighting a gruelling electoral battle to protect and preserve the formidable legacies of their fathers.
Tejashwi Yadav is the articulate younger son of RJD supremo Lalu Prasad who helms the five-party Grand Alliance. Tejashwi Yadav has been Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister for a couple years. However, he faces the electorate for the first time without his charismatic father by his side.
Chirag Paswan, to whom his father Ram Vilas Paswan had passed on the baton of the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) in his lifetime, is ploughing a lonely furrow in the absence of the wise counsel of his father, the redoubtable Dalit leader from Bihar with a national appeal, who died a few days ago.
Chirag, the sitting Lok Sabha MP from Jamui, faces the daunting task of carrying forward the legacy of his father. Paswan (jr) walked out of the NDA in Bihar when his father was on the death bed. He has been furiously attacking Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who is also the JD(U) boss and the ruling coalition’s chief ministerial contender.
However, Chirag has been all the while professing his loyalty to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He has called himself Modi’s ‘Hanuman’.
With the support of his numerically small but assertive Paswan castemen, the LJP president hopes to clinch sufficient number of seats in the 243-member Bihar assembly to stay relevant in state politics.
The party had won six Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 elections, largely because of the alliance it had with the BJP and JD(U). It had won just two seats in the 2015 assembly polls.
According to analysts, Tejashwi is comparatively on a more firm footing, particularly because of the preponderance of the Yadavs, the single biggest caste in Bihar. In several constituencies Yadav candidates have won and finished second election after election.
Though Lalu Prasad may not be around to lead his army in the electoral battlefield, many in the opposition claim, he had a decisive say in selecting candidates and finalising the seat-sharing formula while still serving time in a Ranchi jail after his conviction in the fodder scam.
The RJD-led alliance has the Congress, CPI, CPI(M) and CPI-ML as its constituents. The Muslims have, by and large, stood behind the RJD-Congress combine and, according to close watchers of the poll scene, things will be no different this time.
Tejashwi’s elder brother Tej Pratap, a sitting MLA from Mahua, has shifted to Hasanpur in Samastipur district. Chirag has nominated his cousin Krishna Raj from Rosera constituency.
Apart from Tejashwi and Chirag, who have big shoes to fill, a bevy of young men and women belonging to lesser political clans are set to try their luck at the hustings.
RJD vice-president Shivanand Tiwari’s son Rahul Tiwari is seeking re-election from Shahpur seat in Buxar, while its state unit head Jagdanand Singh’s son Sudhakar Singh has got ticket from Ramgarh.
Jai Prakash Narain Yadav, a former Union Minister considered close to the RJD supremo, has managed to secure a ticket for his daughter Divya Prakash from Tarapur and brother Vijay Prakash from Jamui.
In Jamui, Vijay Prakash will cross swords with Sherayasi Singh, Commonwealth Games shooting gold medallist and daughter of former Union Minister late Digvijay Singh. Sherayasi is the BJP nominee for the seat.
