Nitish Kumar’s Plan To Revive JD(U) In Jharkhand Could Stress Test His Alliance With BJP In Bihar

On 27 July 2024, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar held a meeting with key leaders of Janata Dal (United) or JD(U). The meeting centred around strategy for contesting Jharkhand assembly elections 2024.

The meeting, held at Kumar’s official residence was attended by Khiru Mahto, a Rajya Sabha member and head of Jharkhand JD(U), along with the national working president Sanjay Jha, JD(U) Jharkhand in-charge Ashok Choudhary, and other leaders.

Mahto submitted a list of 11 probable candidates of JD(U) for upcoming elections. All these seats are believed to be those which JD(U) had won between 2000 and 2009. Since 2014, the party has not tasted success in Jharkhand.

Contrary to political wisdom, JD(U) is taking a risky route for poll success in the state. Given that Sudesh Mahato’s All Jharkhand Student Union Party (AJSUP) and Jairam Mahato’s Jharkhandi Bhasha Khatian Sangharsh Samiti (JBKSS) have already staked claims on Kurmi voters (nearly 25 per cent) in the state, JD(U) was believed to lay more emphasis on Bihari voters.

However, in the meeting, 13 leaders of Kurmi community were present and demanded Kumar to raise their demands of including Kurmis in the list of Scheduled Tribes. Kumar assured them that he will be raising their demand before President Droupadi Murmu, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

"The meeting was called in view of requests from Kurmi and Kushwaha leaders of Jharkhand who had been seeking an audience with Kumar," said Shravan Kumar, senior JD(U) leader and minister in the Bihar cabinet.

The meeting comes in the backdrop of two meetings held between Saryu Roy, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rebel and head of Bhartiya Jan Morcha (BJM). BJM wants to contest Jharkhand elections with JD(U) and has even unilaterally announced the same. However, JD(U) rejected any such alliance.

On the probability of JD(U)-BJM alliance, Khiru Mahto said that Roy is welcome in alliance, but he will need to join JD(U) for contesting elections. In effect, JD(U) preferably would want to contest the election in alliance with BJP, which was confirmed by Shravan Kumar too.

For BJP, the public announcement has come as a challenge. 

If it takes JD(U) on board in Jharkhand, AJSUP will not be happy since both parties will be targeting the same vote bank. However, in case JD(U) is not chosen by BJP, it may result in JD(U) fielding more than 40 candidates as they have done in the past.

These candidates may not win, but will definitely take away votes which could have gone with the BJP-AJSUP alliance.