http://timesofindia
Mahadalit card may isolate Paswan & dent Left vote-bank
Arun Kumar, TNN 20 November 2009, 01:58am IST
PATNA: The Mahadalit card seems to be a double-edged sword. Apart from
having the possibility of marginalising Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram
Vilas
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Paswan in Bihar politics, it may also make a dent into those Dalit
votes that are still garnered by the Left parties.
The Left parties became sensitive to the caste question only in recent
years. That, too, after caste-based parties like RJD, Samajwadi Party,
LJP and BSP created a platform for themselves following the
publication of the Mandal Commission report. While these made inroads
into the vote-bank of all mainstream parties, Congress and Left were
impacted the most.
Since Independence, Congress has been ruling the country through its
Brahmin-Dalit-
backward-Dalit combine under the umbrella of various streams of
Lohiaite groups that eroded its traditional vote-bank. The new
caste-based politics also attracted a sizeable section of Muslim
votes, too.
This phenomenon has forced Congress as well as mainstream Left parties
in the state to dabble in the "politics of caste identity".
The Left, however, seems to be behaving like an ostrich. CPI(M L)
Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya said Nitish's
Mahadalit card is nothing but a mere ploy to carve out a political
turf for himself that will backfire on him.
He said basic issues related to land, livelihood, dignity and
development of Dalits/Mahadalits have been left totally unattended and
as revealed in course of a CPI(ML) fact-finding team's visit to Amausi
village in Khagaria district, more than 100 Dalit youths were
languishing in jail on trumped-up charges.
CPI national executive member U N Mishra said though pitting one
section of the poor against the other again and again might serve the
purpose of garnering votes, it would ultimately not improve the lot of
the poorest of the poor.
But as expected there is a strong reaction from the LJP. Paswan's
younger brother and state LJP chief Pashupati Kumar Paras described it
as a "dirty political game" and a "cruel joke with Dalits".
Balendra Das, deputy chief of Paswan-sponsored Bihar Pradesh Dalit
Sena, too, echoed the same. He has described the act of according
Ravidas a Mahadalit status a mere ploy to woo the Ravidas caste. State
Congress president Anil Kumar Sharma has dismissed it as a "political
stunt".
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