Like father, like son? Why Chirag Paswan's Bihar foray is bad news for Nitish Kumar

Union minister Chirag Paswan with Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. (File/X)

Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) chief Chirag Paswan recently announced his foray in the Bihar Assembly elections scheduled to be held later this year from a seat that he left the people of the state to choose for him.

"I will contest the assembly polls in Bihar. I will contest not just in Bihar but for Bihar and its people. I am the son of Ramvilas Paswan. I will realise the dreams of my father and work for 'Bihar first, Bihari first' to change Bihar," Paswan said, resurrecting an old slogan he had coined ahead of the Assembly polls in 2020 as the chief of the then undivided Lok Janshakti Party.

"It is for the people of Bihar to decide from which seat in the state I should contest in the upcoming assembly elections. Whenever I take a political decision, I take it for the sake of the state and its people," the 42-year-old Hajipur MP declared, adding that his party could contest all 243 seats in the state Assembly.

On the face of it, Chirag's remarks appear harmless - aimed at re-energising his party ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in Bihar, and claim a greater share of seats based on his party's performance in the Lok Sabha elections last year where it won all 5 seats it contested as part of the National Democratic Alliance in Bihar.

However, it remains to be seen whether the LJP(RV) chief's dare to the JD(U)-BJP is part of a genuine effort to reinvent his party in the state or a gambit it hopes to use as a bargaining chip during seat-sharing talks within the NDA.

A look at the data from the previous Assembly elections could help add context to Chirag Paswan's recent comments. The LJP(RV) contested the 2020 Assembly elections outside the NDA over differences with JD(U) chief and incumbent Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

Despite winning only one seat of the 135 seats it contested, the LJP managed to inflict significant damage to the JD(U)'s poll performance. Data from the 2020 polls shows that the LJP had polled more votes that the Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal (United) in 32 of the 38 seats where they were pitted against each other.

Interestingly, in 26 of these, the number of votes polled in the LJP's favour was higher than the margin by which the JD(U) lost these seats. The LJP was the runner-up in five other seats while it bagged the Maithani seat by a narrow margin of 333 votes.

The JD(U), BJP, Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) and the Hindustani Awam Morcha had contested the elections under the NDA umbrella in the 2020 polls. As per the seat-sharing arrangement, the BJP contested 110 seats, the JD(U) 115, the VIP 11 and HAM at 7. Of them, the BJP emerged with the best strike rate winning 74 seats followed by the JD(U) at 43 and the VIP and HAM at 4 each.

The LJP(RV) returned to the NDA fold only in 2023 and contested the Lok Sabha elections as part of the alliance. The LJP(RV) gained from the return and bagged all five Lok Sabha seats it contested, consolidating its presence within the NDA and marking a turnaround.

The LJP(RV)'s return and Lok Sabha strike, however, added a new dimension to the NDA's already tricky seat-sharing discussions. JD(U) leaders, while denying the buzz around a strain on ties within the NDA on the seat-sharing issue, admit that the LJP(RV)'s return to the NDA has caused some unease.

"Every political party wants to contest on the maximum number of seats. But the NDA is determined to make Bihar a developed state under the leadership of Nitish Kumar… There will be no conflict and seat-sharing will happen with understanding between allies," JD(U) spokesperson Anjum Ara said.

It is in this context that Chirag Paswan's renewed aggression needs to be seen in. Seat-sharing talks are yet to begin and Paswan is aware that the JD(U) would be wary of ceding too much space to the LJP(RV). At the same time, it remains cognizant of the damage it inflicted in the 2020 elections when it contested on its own.

Even with a lion's share of the 40-odd remaining seats for the LJP(RV), what justifies Paswan's recent aggression with his larger ambitions of a future in Bihar's crowded political landscape and extend the LJP(RV)'s footprint in the state beyond the 6 percent Paswan vote bank as suggested by his party's decision to field him from a general seat?

Understanding Chirag's gameplan requires a peek into the past in Bihar -- one that Nitish Kumar would be wary of. It was 20 years ago when the Assembly elections of February 2005 that ended the Lalu Yadav family’s 15-year rule in the state.

The three constituents of the then ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) — the LJP, the Congress and Lalu Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal — contested the polls separately. Paswan fielded candidates against the RJD, but not against the Congress. The RJD emerged as the single largest party with 75 seats, the LJP with 29 seats, and the Congress with 10. Together, they could have ensured that Lalu-Rabri’s 15-year reign would have continued with the support of smaller parties.

On the other hand, the NDA secured 92 of the 243 seats where 122 was the majority mark. Ram Vilas Paswan emerged as the kingmaker announcing that he would join hands “neither with the communal BJP nor with the corrupt and casteist RJD” and insisted that he would only support a Muslim chief minister. Lalu did not agree and a fresh election was held, bringing Nitish Kumar to power as the Chief Minister for the first time.

In targeting Nitish while staying close to the BJP, Chirag may be borrowing a leaf out of his father's playbook as he tried to clip Nitish Kumar's wings while also maintaining "brotherly" ties with the Rashtriya Jana Dal's Tejashwi Yadav. After all, one can't mathematically rule out the possibility of Paswan tying up with the RJD if he can get the LJP(RV) to play the kingmaker.