New Delhi:
Jharkhand is all set to get its first non-tribal chief minister with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday naming its national vice-president Raghubar Das for the post.
Das, hand-picked for the post by BJP Parliamentary Board on Wednesday, was formally elected leader of the BJP Legislative Party at its meeting held in the state capital Ranchi on Friday.
“I will bring development and good governance to Jharkhand,” Das who served in the past as deputy chief minister in Jharkhand Mukti Morcha-BJP coalition government, said after his unanimous election.
Das along with a tribal deputy chief minister and a small cabinet is expected to be sworn-in on Sunday.
Federal Health Minister J.P. Nadda and senior BJP leader Vinay Sahasrabuddhe who were appointed as observers for Jharkhand oversaw Das’ smooth election.
Jharkhand was carved out of Bihar in 2000 as a separate state and homeland for Bihar’s tribals. The state has since seen nine governments under five chief ministers and three rounds of President’s Rule. The political instability ensured the state lagged behind on development and surged on top of the corruption chart.
Das’ road to become the first non-tribal chief minister was paved with defeats of tribal stalwarts including BJP’s thrice chief minister Arjun Munda and senior leader J.B. Tubid. Former deputy chief minister and ally All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU) Party chief Sudesh Mahato was also defeated.
By and large tribal leaders fares badly in the just concluded elections as the outgoing chief minister Hemant Soren of JMM tasted defeat in one of the two seats he contested while the first chief minister Babulal Marandi, who quit BJP in the past to float his own Jharkhand Vikas Morcha lost both the seats he contested.
Sources in the BJP suggested that even in the event of Arjun Munda’s victory, Jharkhand would have got its first non-tribal chief minister considering party’s national president Amit Shah has made up his mind in advance to name a non-tribal as chief minister to get the state rid of corruption and put it on the path of development. BJP had made fast development of neighbouring state Chhattisgarh, which also came into being in 2000 as a quintessential tribal state, as an example. The state is rated as the fasted developing state of India under a non-tribal chief minister Raman Singh, who is serving his third successive tenure.
The only issue left was to placate Arjun Munda. The party has promised him membership to Rajya Sabha and making him one of the national vice-presidents in place of Das.
Munda apparently has succeeded in striking a bargain for his fellow tribal leaders. BJP sources say that he has proposed names of Neelkanth Singh Munda and Shivshankar Oraon along with Louis Marandi. While one among Neelkanth Singh Munda and Oraon would become deputy chief minister, the other two would become cabinet ministers with key portfolios. Louis Marandi had defeated the outgoing chief minister Hemant Soren from Dumka constituency, considered as JMM’s bastion.
Das, 59, originally belongs to Chhattisgarh but was born and brought up in the steel city of Jamshedpur. He won Jamshedpur East seat for the fifth consecutive time with a huge margin of more than 70,000 votes.
Meanwhile, efforts to form a popular government in the northern state Jammu and Kashmir, which too went to polls along with Jharkhand but gave a fractured mandate, have picked up.
BJP, which emerged the second largest party with 25 seats in the 87-member state assembly, has got in touch with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which won 28 seats for a possible alliance.
BJP is already in contact with the outgoing chief minister Omar Abdullah who heads the National Conference. Abdullah has met BJP chief Amit Shah on Thursday and postponed his planned visit to London to see his parents.
PDP is learnt to have told BJP that it is not open for rotating chief minister’s post and wants its top leader Mufti Mohammad Sayeed to occupy the chief minister’s post for entire tenure of six years. Mufti and Congress party’s Ghulam Nabi Azad had shared chief minister’s post for three years each between 2002 and 2008 when the state had elected another hung assembly.
BJP sources said they would prefer to align with Abdullah’s National Conference since such an arrangement would ensure one of BJP’s lawmakers becomes chief minister and remains in the post until the assembly completes its full term.
