Muslim voters to have big say in third and final phase of Bihar polls

Patna: The Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) led National Democratic Alliance is trying hard to polarise the votes along the communal lines as focus shifts to Muslim voters in the third and final round of the state elections in Bihar. A total of 78 assembly segments spread over 15 districts will go to polls in the last phase on November 7.

All these districts going to polls in the final round are spread from north-east to north-west bordering Nepal in the north and West Bengal in the east. But, what is politically significant is that Muslim voters have considerable presence on most of the 78 seats and are said to be the “deciding factor” in at least 24 assembly constituencies across four district of Purnia, Araria, Katihar and Kishanganj, known as “Seemanchal” (border zone). Muslims account for some 67.70 percent of the total population in Kishanganj, 43 percent in Katihar, 40 percent in Araria and 38 percent in Purnia, as per an estimate.

In the last 2015 assembly polls, the Grand Alliance which then comprised Janata Dal United (JD-U) headed by chief minister Nitish Kumar, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) headed by Lalu Prasad and the Congress party had emerged victorious on 54 out of total 78 seats. This time, however, the JD-U is not a part of the Grand Alliance and is contesting elections in alliance with the BJP.

Keeping in view the presence of Muslim voters in large numbers, the NDA leaders have now brought sensitive and controversial issues, such as religion, nationalism and Bangladeshi infiltration in the poll campaign in their last-ditch effort to polarise the voters along communal lines. The very effort had paid rich dividends in the last 2019 Lok Sabha polls when the NDA had made a clean sweep, winning 39 out of total 40 LS seats in Bihar.

In the first two phases, the BJP had focussed its campaign along “lawlessness, misgovernance and corruption” of the previous 15-year-old RJD regime which remained in power from 1990 to 2005 in Bihar. In the last phase, the BJP’s star campaigners have suddenly switched gears and are talking about issues which remained missing from the poll campaign or remained largely muted so far.

Masses were left startled when Prime Minister Narendra Modi devoted much of his election speech to talking about how the opposition parties hate chanting slogans in favour of the motherland and presiding deity. In fact, he began his rallies from these slogans and making the people chant them as the crowds followed. The PM addressed two election rallies on Tuesday.

“One group says ‘Don’t chant ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’, the other one says it given them a headache. Now they’ve come together to seek votes from the people of Bihar. They don’t want to chant ‘Jai Sri Ram’,” the PM was quoted as telling the crowd by NDTV.

Federal defence minister Rajnath Singh brought Pakistan in the poll campaign and raised the issue of quick release of Indian Air force Wing Commander Abhinandan whereas Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath promised to throw out alleged Bangladeshi infiltrators from the border region if the NDA returns to power. He also raised the issue of the abrogation of Article 370 granting special status to Jammu and Kashmir, foundation-laying for Ram temple in Ayodhya, criminalising Muslim’s Instant Divorce and surgical strikes.

“We are not paying attention to such things; they often come up during election time. We were born and brought up in India and our only concern is the progress of our motherland. This time again, we will go for development,” said Rustam Ali Khan from Kochadhaman block in Kishanganj.

In sharp contrast to the BJP, the opposition Grand Alliance is seeking votes over the issues of employment, governance, migration, price rise and education. Grand Alliance comprising the RJD, Congress and Left parties have declared Tejashwi Yadav as their CM face for Bihar.