 "Voters wait in queue to cast their vote during second phase of Bihar elections at Gaya")
For flying journalists, taxi drivers become the first, and in many cases, very important guide to what is happening around. My own experience is Bihari drivers are very talkative and extremely opinionated. During the course of my journey through parts of Bihar, I interacted with three of them. The first of them, a resident of Hajipur, almost convinced me that Nitish Kumar-led Mahagathbandhan is going to sweep the polls. He claimed to have attended many rallies and visited many villages and towns recently to gauge the public opinion.
The second one, a Maithil Brahmin from Supaul district and a die-hard Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) supporter, wanted the National Democratic Alliance to win but was not sure which way the tide was turning. He blamed wrong selection of candidates by the NDA and said that the BJP’s poor showing, if it happens, could be because of RSS chief’s remark on reservation.
The third driver, an OBC from Purnea district, was confident that the BJP will emerge as the single largest party. According to him, if the BJP falls short of majority it should blame itself for raking up issues like beef ban and Pakistan in the middle of campaign.
Three drivers from three regions not only differed on the outcome of the elections. They had different takes on most of the issues being discussed and debated during the course of campaign this time. The story is not just of three drivers. The range of people we spoke to believed in and articulated sets of narratives that were at variance with each other.
For BJP supporters- men and women, the perceived threat of the return of Jungle Raj, a euphemism for Lalu Prasad days, is real. For them, Nitish Kumar’s assurance to the contrary is not convincing enough.
However, the slogan of Jungle Raj evokes a completely different response from Yadavs and other supporters of Mahagathbandhan. “Jungle raj is like an abuse to us. Are we junglee just because we talk about empowerment of Dalits and OBCs?” a Yadav told me in Vaishali district. His friend told me a mythological story according to which Yadavs had to be banished to jungle because their forefather Yadu stood by the principle and did not succumb to temptation. For them, Jungle Raj means egalitarian society.
The difference is not just caste specific. It is region specific too. And sometimes members of the same caste cluster look at issues differently. So the probability of arriving at any conclusion based on interaction with people, even if randomly selected, is quite high.
Even at the risk of going wrong, I will still talk about some of the broad trends that I observed. My interaction with a range of people in as many as 10 districts of the state has convinced me that there is no fence sitter this time who is going to be swayed this way or that way through last minute campaigning. People have, by and large, made up their mind and they are voting according to their conviction. Higher voter turnout in the first four phases is perhaps an indication of that.
Another visible trend is that Nitish Kumar has retained most of his popularity despite 10 years of incumbency. Even those who said they won’t vote for him did acknowledge that the Nitish Kumar regime has been very good for Bihar. What is more, supporters of Lalu Prasad have begun to take pride in the leadership of Nitish Kumar. Whether the goodwill translates into votes is very difficult to guess though.
And my third observation is that only three leaders—Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad—have occupied mind space in Bihar. They are the ones who are part of most conversation and others are seldom discussed. The outcome therefore will be a reflection of who has occupied the maximum space.
