Silent on PM & Sonia,selective on Advani,Nitish walks tightrope talk

Subtly — and sometimes not-so subtly — he skirts the BJP’s slogan of “Advani for PM.” Neither does he make any critical mention of either Manmohan Singh or Sonia Gandhi or any UPA policies. The signal: he’s keeping the door ajar,just a little bit,depending on how the numbers add up.

Under attack from RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav for “sitting in the lap of Advani”,Nitish is cleverly positioning himself to be “near and yet distant enough” from the Sangh Parivar. Instead,his target: the RJD-LJP duo of Lalu and Ram Vilas Paswan as he repeatedly reminds voters of “the dark days when Lalu was in power.”

Despite a sore throat,Nitish addressed six meetings in the north Bihar constituencies of Jhanjharpur,Madhubani,Darbhanga,Samastipur,Unjiarpur and Vaishali. Of these,Madhubani and Darbhanga are being contested by the BJP and in others JD(U) nominees are in the fray.

At Basopatti,in the Jhanjharpur segment,more than four-fifth of Kumar’s speechtime is centered on his role in Bihar’s growth. “Agar aap chahate hain Bihar vikas raaste pe chalta rahe,to humko taqat dijiye. Hamare anukul sarkar Centre me banaiye taki Bihar ko vishesh rajya ka darja mil sake. Vishesh rajya ka darja milega to aur road banenge,kal karkhane khulenge aur sabko rojgar milega. Kisi Bihari ko mazdoori karne rajya ke bahar nahi jana padega.” (“If you want Bihar to move on the path to development,give me strength,elect a favourable government at the Centre so that the state gets special status. Special status will mean more roads,more industry,more jobs. Then no Bihari will have to go out of the state for jobs.”).

This gets a little rewrite at the next meeting in Arer in the Muslim-dominated Madhubani constituency from where BJP’s Hukum Deo Narayan Yadav is locked in a triangular fight with Congress’s Shakeel Ahmed (Minister of State) and RJD’s state president Abdul Bari Siddiqui.

Here Advani’s name figures in his speech but the stress once again remains on Bihar’s “special status.” He also brings up delayed justice in the Bhagalpur riots lest his secular credentials get fogged.

“Lalu bhoot dikha rahe hain. Hum Advaniji ko Prime Minister banana chahte hain. Advaniji ne kaha hai unkee sarkar banegee to Bihar ko visesh rajya ka darja denge. Bhajpa Bihar me hamare saath sarakar me hai. Humne Bhagalpur me danga karne walo ko saza dilaya jisko Lalu ke sarkar ne saboot rahte riha kar diya tha. Ladai kaam karne walo aur baat banane walo mein hai.” (“Lalu is raising the Advani bogey. I want to make Advani the Prime Minister. Advani has promised special status for Bihar if his government is formed at the Centre. The BJP is in the government with me and yet we punished those responsible for the Bhagalpur riots,those who had been let off by the Lalu government despite evidence. The battle is between those who work and those who only talk.”)

Advani’s campaign in Bihar,too,is limited to constituencies being contested by the BJP. The JD(U) does not want the saffron mascot to campaign in constituencies it’s contesting,worried it might rattle Muslim voters. So far,Advani has addressed three election rallies in Sasaram,Buxar and Nawada — all with BJP nominees. Nitish shared the dais with Advani only in Sasaram where Advani,significantly,promised a “special state” status.

Nitish’s attack against Lalu-Paswan is carefully crafted. In his rallies,Nitish reminds voters about the “dark days under the RJD regime” and tries to instil fear of the return of the era. “If by mistake they return,just imagine what will happen to you. So don’t allow Bihar to go backwards. They are concerned about their sons,brothers,wives and even brothers-in-law. My concern is for 9 crore Biharis. Every youth is my son and daughter,I am working tirelessly to make their life better”,he says to loud cheers from the crowd.

Even to upper-castes,Nitish echoes the same message. With Lalu wooing sections of upper-caste voters amid reports that Brahmins and Rajputs were annoyed,Nitish reminds voters about Lalu’s tirade against upper-castes. “Paswanji used to say that Lalu’s one hand is on your feet,the other around your neck. These days,Laluji is touching the feet of Brahmins. After elections,you can get a sense of where his hand will go by what Paswanji had said.”