Draupadi Murmu — from school teacher to presidential candidate

Droupadi Murmu (Image: PTI)

States in India are structured on a linguistic basis. If you hail from Odisha, you are an Odia; if you belong to West Bengal, you are a Bengali; if you belong to Tamil Nadu, you are a Tamil, and so on. Where does that leave tribals like Santhals?

Santhalis hail from Odisha, West Bengal, and Jharkhand, but have lost their identity in the greater identity of the states they belong to. The same is the case with Draupadi Murmu, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s candidate for President of India. She is a Santhal from the lesser known Mayurbhanj district in Odisha. Originally, she hails from Rairangpur, a tehsil headquarters which is 82 km from Baripada, and 287 km from state capital Bhubaneswar. Her home was earlier in Uparbeda village, which until recently did not have power connection.

Her late husband Shyam Charan Murmu used to work in a bank, and her only surviving child Itishree Murmu is also employed by a bank in Bhubaneswar. Her two sons passed away in a span of three years between 2009 and 2012.

Starting off as a primary school teacher, she soon became a junior assistant in the irrigation department. Both her father and grandfather were village heads under the panchayat raj system, and Draupadi Murmu became a member of the Rairangpur municipality in 1997. Soon thereafter she was elected as the chairperson.

In 2000 she was elected as an MLA from Rairangpur, and became a minister on state in the Biju Janata Dal (BJD)-BJP coalition government. She held portfolios such as commerce and transport, and then animal husbandry and fisheries till 2005.

In 2015, she was appointed Governor of the predominantly tribal state of Jharkhand. While in office, she refused assent to two Bills — the Chotanagpur Tenancy Act 1908, and the Santhal Pargana Tenancy Act 1949 that sought to use the land for commercial purpose without changing the land rights. She demitted office in July 2021.

Interestingly, Itishree Murmu told Odia TV channels that her mother and she got to know about the nomination from friends, and were taken by surprise. The news could not be confirmed as at that time there was no power at home due to load shedding. At first they were not convinced by the news because in 2017, during the nomination for President of India, Draupadi Murmu’s name did the rounds. This time, however, it was not a rumour.

In 2017, Ramnath Kovind, a Supreme Court lawyer and Dalit, was the BJP’s choice for President. Kovind has been a low key President, and one will have to wait and see the impact Draupadi Murmu has on the office of the President of India.

By choosing a tribal, woman leader as its candidate for President, the BJP has delivered a masterstroke. This is evident in the fact that political parties outside the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) have extended their support to Draupadi Murmu. This includes the Trinamool Congress whose chief Mamata Banerjee said that had she been consulted, she would not have thought of nominating somebody else. While voting for the presidential candidates, some MLAs have broken party lines (like the Congress MLA from Odisha) to vote for Draupadi Murmu.

The results will be announced on July 21, and as the Rashtrapathi Bhavan gets its latest occupant, a new page will be added as a testament to the strength of India’s democracy.