The Mokama test for Bihar administration
The arrest of Anant Singh, the JD(U) candidate, on Sunday morning, sends out the message that the State is in charge and no politician will be allowed to challenge its writ
A key aspect of the NDA campaign has been that a vote for the Mahagathbandhan would mean a return of the “jungle raj” in Bihar. This narrative sought to recall a time in the 1990s, when violence by bahubalis (men with criminal records) was frequent and mostly condoned by the administration headed by Lalu Prasad, then chief minister and the face of Rashtriya Janata Dal. A significant achievement of Nitish Kumar’s tenure in office was the restoration of the rule of law and the reining in of politicians, who were law unto themselves. Last week’s poll violence in Mokama, a town notorious as a playfield of bahubalis, was a throwback to a past Bihar wants to forget. That the key figure in the violence — a supporter of the Jan Suraj Party (JSP) with a crime record who was shot when workers of JSP and NDA clashed — was the candidate of Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United), threatened to unravel the ruling alliance’s narrative about law and order. Mokama was a test for the ruling alliance, especially since the Mahagathbandhan campaign had made rising crime an election issue.
The arrest of Anant Singh, the JD(U) candidate, on Sunday morning, sends out the message that the State is in charge and no politician will be allowed to challenge its writ. Singh is an influential upper caste leader with a record of winning multiple elections. The arrest will resonate beyond Mokama and serve as a warning for politicians to respect the sanctity of the law. This is an election where political parties are offering agendas of hope, of building infrastructure and industry, of opportunities and jobs, of peace and prosperity. All this is possible only if the police function as a neutral arm of the State and independent of political influence. Rebuilding Bihar is a long haul, of course, but the decline in violence in recent years, thanks to the reassertion of the State, is evidence that it is on the right path. That’s a precious gain and has to be preserved at all costs.
