Battle for Dalit votes hots up in Bihar

PATNA: The battle for the Dalit votes is on in Bihar. The stakes for state's tallest Dalit leader, Ram Vilas Paswan, is high and he has been busy trying to counter his chief political advisory chief minister Nitish Kumar on the issue. Holding a series of meetings, Paswan has given a call to Dalits to boycott Nitish Kumar for allegedly insulting them by calling them "Mahadalits". His party has petitioned the National SC/ST Commission chairman Sardar Buta Singh to direct the state government to dissolve the Mahadalit Commission.He has also ridiculed Nitish's claim onshowering gifts to Dalits and makes promises. "When we return to power we willpurchase back the house of late Bhola Paswan Sastri (former CM of Bihar) andturn it into a museum. Nitish recently remarked that he would rename a park inSastri's name as if he was doing a favour to some beggar," Paswan said. Healleged that the 3-decimel land given to Dalits were "troubled land". "We willgive each Dalit family one bigha of land when we come to power," hesaid.During the last three years, Nitish has been targetting thesection of Dalits he has christened as Mahadalits consisting of 23 of the 24Dalit sub-castes __ leaving out only Paswans from the ambit. Originally heincluded 18 of them. He added four more. Just after the defeat in the bypolls,he added the Ravidas sub-caste-who are numerically even stronger than thePaswans.The NDA organized the Mahadalit meet in Patna which was considered inpolitical circles as a success."Our government has provided 18 percent resevation to SCs and STs in panchayat bodies as a result of which over1,400 mukhiyas in the state are Dalits," deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi said. Healso pointed towards the government's initiative of providing Rs 10,000 to eachDalit students who passed their exams in first division.The LJPchief enjoyed the status of "King maker" in Bihar for a decade. He used toflaunt the fact that when he was with the NDA the political scales tiltedtowards the NDA and when he joined the UPA the situation resevered with the UPAsweeping the polls. He declared that because he had fougth the assembly pollsindependently, the NDA managed to emerge victorious. However, the 2009 Lok Sabhastripped him of the the "King-maker" image as the RJD-LJP alliance came acropper and Paswan himself lost. With his very political survival in the stateis under question. Paswan is going all out to maintain his Dalit mascotimage.