Headache For BJP As JD(U) Eyes Jharkhand Expansion

Saryu Roy, a member of Jharkhand's legislative assembly (MLA), met Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar at his residence in Patna on 13 July.

He was there to explore whether the Kumar-led Janata Dal (United) (JD(U)) would join hands with him for the Jharkhand assembly election 2024.

He succeeded after "a brief but fruitful discussion."

"An agreement was reached to contest the Jharkhand Assembly elections together. The JD (U) leadership will soon take a decision on the remaining election formalities,“ Roy wrote on X.

Roy is a former heavyweight of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He was part of the Jharkhand cabinet under then-chief minister Raghubar Das. However, the two were seldom on the same page.

As a result, he left the BJP and changed his constituency to beat the sitting BJP CM Das in the 2019 assembly election.

Currently, Roy is the president of the Bharatiya Jantantra Morcha (BJM) and wishes to contest the upcoming assembly election. The issue is that Roy’s party has a weak base; he is the only well-known face in his party.

Even when he defeated Das in 2019, Hemant Soren’s Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) had supported Roy's candidacy against Das.

Now, the BJM wants to contest 30 seats in Jharkhand, for which Roy needs both collaborators and candidates.

Days before his meeting with Kumar, Roy met Kunal Sarangi, who recently left the BJP, allegedly because he did not get a Lok Sabha ticket from the Jamshedpur constituency.

Sarangi now wants to contest the election from the Baharagora seat, one that he won in the 2014 election. Roy is said to have offered to fulfill his wish.

Within hours of meeting Sarangi, Roy also met Chief Minister Hemant Soren and his wife, Kalpana Soren. Roy had supported the Soren government from outside in 2019, but withdrew his support later over differences with minister Bannu Gupta.

In the latest floor test, Roy was neutral — an indication that he may tilt both ways in the upcoming election.

Roy’s meetings will mean more headaches for Shivraj Singh Chouhan — the man in charge of BJP's poll strategy in Jharkhand.

Simultaneously, JD(U)'s plan to expand beyond Bihar is something the party will have to deal with.

From the time Jharkhand became a new state, JD(U) has struggled for its existence there.

When Kumar was highlighted as a vikas purush (a man of development) in 2005, the party had six MLAs in the state. From six, the MLA count came down to two in the 2009 assembly election and then to zero in the 2014 and 2019 assembly elections.

In 2024, the party bases its prospects on two vote banks: namely, the Kurmis and Biharis.

"Bihari" is a relatively new classification in Jharkhand politics, with efforts underway by politicians to demarcate Jharkhand as a land of tribals. Biharis are those whose culture (majorly language) is believed to have originated in Bihar.

Rough estimates indicate that both Biharis and Kurmis comprise 29-32 per cent of the state's population. However, in the current scenario, the reliance will be more on Biharis (7-10 per cent), as Kurmi voters are scattered between the All Jharkhand Students Union Party (AJSUP) and Jairam Mahato's Jharkhand Loktantrik Krantikari Morcha (JLKM).

For the BJP, which is looking to wrestle back Jharkhand from Soren and team, this is a new problem.

On one hand, BJP state president Babulal Marandi needs to be seen as holding his own against Roy. On the other hand, the party needs the support of Kumar at the Centre as well as in Bihar. For that, it will need to accept Kumar's decision to include Roy in the coalition.

If the BJP caves in, it will have to finalise a fresh seat-sharing formula with JD(U) and Roy’s BJM. Any such arrangement is certain to invite backlash from its party cadre, the likes of which resulted in the defeat of JMM import Sita Soren from the Dumka Lok Sabha seat in the 2024 general election.

The BJP is currently stuck between death and the devil. If it accedes to Roy and Kumar's demand, it is a problem; if it doesn’t, the duo will most likely open a third front in Jharkhand politics.

The good news for BJP is that it has time. Until the BJP and JD(U) build their base, the BJP can consolidate its position to stop the emergence of a third front.