The two opposition veterans, Lalu Yadav and Nitish Kumar, strongly nurse the view that RSS and Modi have been busy creating the controversy about Bharat and India simply for ensuring that the Hindu voters of the Hindi heartland rally behind the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha election.

The Hindi heartland has been quite vulnerable to exploits of‘nationalism’; which is why the RSS and BJP leaders have been planning to play with the word ‘Bharat’ and invoke ‘Bharatiya’ sentiment. Since they have been feeling scared to directly exploit nationalism in the ensuing election, as the opposition has christened their alliance bloc, I.N.D.I.A., as a symbol of their united identity, the BJP-RSS machine has been toying with the word Bharat to gain some sympathy and support of the Hindus.

Nevertheless, both the Bihar stalwarts feel that this would not cut much ice in Bihar as the MGB leaders have been unmasking the RSS and BJP’s design for long now. Only on Saturday, both the leaders cautioned their rank and file not to be carried away by the skewed narrative of RSS and Modi and came out with the clarion call of creating a "BJP-mukt Bihar”, which is an ingredient of its call for “BJP-mukt India” in 2024.

The strategy is clear and transparent. While Nitish holds that the BJP must not only be defeated; instead the MGB leaders work hard to weed out the rightist and feudal forces from Bihar forever, while the RJD supremo Lalu Yadav has said the divisive forces must be routed out. Lalu said saffron party and its parent organisation RSS were making attempts to divide the country on religious lines once again and wanted to end the provision of reservation for Dalits and backwards. He urged the people of Bihar to vow “to oust BJP in 2024 by remaining united to protect the country and the minorities”.

Both the leaders hold that responding to the Bharat-India controversy would eventually mean walking into the trap of the RSS. They feel that this move of RSS and BJP would have to be rebuffed and given befitting reply, but the I.N.D.I.A. alliance must focus on primary objective. I.N.D.I.A. leaders by focussing on the manufactured and superfluous electoral and political issues of the day will simply create more confusion amongst the common people, and they might fall into the trap of the vicious campaign launched by the Sangh Parivar.

Nitish Kumar has a valid argument that the Congress should seriously ponder who would be benefited in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls if it does not make a quick move on the issue of seat-sharing. Moreover, evolving the effective strategy to counter RSS move to arouse the communal passion and divide the society must be achieved fast. The MGB leaders foresee creation of a scene like 2019 which helped the BJP sweep the election.

In Bihar 2019, the BJP had got 23.58 per cent of votes winning 17 seats; JDU, at that time a constituent of NDA, had got 21.81 per cent winning 16 seats; RJD received 15.36% but did not win even single seat. In this election, Nitish has pledged, the BJP would not get even a single seat. In fact, he had been working with the motto to restrict the BJP to 100 seats across the country.

While the RJD and JD(U) have gathered their resources to fight out the RSS and BJP in Bihar, the Congress leadership is still in the state of strategic inertia. They are yet to come out of the stupor and strive to resuscitate their old base consisting of Brahmins, Rajputs, Bhumihars and Kayasthas. In contrast, the RJD has launched a serious move to bring Rajputs and Bhumihars in its fold, though they have old antagonistic relations with the OBCs, especially with the Yadavs. To a great extent the young leader of RJD, Tejashvi Yadav, has succeeded in his endeavour. This has been causing much consternation in the BJP circles as these two upper castes are the support base of the RSS and BJP.

The MGB is working on the script to reach every nook and corner of the state and expose the nefarious designs of the Sangh Parivar. The leadership is apprehensive of their attempts to foment communal riots in the state or launching an “Angrezi Hatao” movement by the BJP and RSS cadres. While the BJP is sure of the support of the urban middle class, it is busy drawing up strategy to reach out to the village level voters. This task, according to some BJP and RSS leaders, could be carried out by the OBC, EBC and Dalit leaders. Some BJP leaders feel that Samrat Choudhary, a state president of the party who is from OBC, is not competent enough to implement this strategy, though he is trying to keep some upper caste leaders away.

It is in this backdrop Lalu Yadav feels that the party leaders must try to completely identify with the ideology and principles of Babasaheb Ambedkar and expose the duality practiced by the Sangh Parivar, especially RSS, in providing benefit of reservation to the OBCs, EBCs and Dalits. Lalu aims at striking at the root of the Sangh by winning over the trust of the poor. Nitish was even toying with the idea of handing over the baton to Tejashvi ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, but it was the persuasion of other I.N.D.I.A. leaders to continue to hold on to the office for some more time that he dropped the idea for the time being.

The move is the part of the strategy to rebrand Nitish as the voice of the OBCs, EBCs and Dalits, who only wants to unite anti-BJP forces and ensure Modi’s exit. With the RSS and BJP trying to divide the society and country on the lines of Bharat and India, the task for Nitish has also acquired serious dimension. His primary responsibility is to ensure that the BJP does not succeed in dividing the society on the spurious plank of India and Bharat.

Besides his main task would be to keep the flock together. The issue of Bharat is quite emotive and the politicians may succumb to the nationalist charm of this word. Nevertheless, some JD(U) and RJD leaders feel that this is the old agenda of RSS, which Modi has dug up in the present context. Rechristening India as only Bharat, i.e., dropping India from the constitution, is the part of the RSS design to convert into a Hindu Rashtra, with emphasis on Hindu, Hindi and Hindustan.

For Nitish and Lalu, the real worry could be 2024. In the wake of recent controversy, some JDU MPs starting saying that Bharat would catch the imagination of the Hindi-speaking voters and this would be to the disadvantage to I.N.D.I.A. Since they had won the 2019 election on the plank of hyper-nationalism, they nurse the view that in the 2024 election too Bharat will help BJP. They are scared of the possibility of losing their seats.

Obviously in this backdrop, the task to keep the flock united before Nitish and Lalu is more daunting and challenging. They are also haunted with the lurking fear that after September 15, once Sanjay Mishra demits his office of director ED, the ED and CBI may crack down on Lalu. With Lalu in jail, the task to fight Sangh onslaught would become tough for Nitish. Nevertheless, senior JD(U) leaders dismiss these apprehensions and assert that the JD(U) leaders and MPs were not frustrated, disheartened or are in touch with the BJP. They avow that Bihar will expose the communal design of Sangh Parivar veering around use of word Bharat. (IPA Service)