With only weeks to go until the Bihar Assembly elections, the passage of the Waqf (Amendment) Bill has once again heightened the stakes in the Muslim-Yadav voter seesaw. The Bill has sent political waters swirling, especially within Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United), after it was ratified into law by President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday.
Nitish Kumar’s public support for the Bill has caused a rebellion within his party. Dozens of Muslim leaders have quit in protest, among them Mohammad Qasim Ansari of East Champaran, Nawaz Malik of Jamui, and Mohammad Tabrez Siddiqui. They quit on Thursday, and Raju Nayyar and Nadeem Akhtar followed them on Friday. The leaders were believed to hold key positions in JD(U)’s minority wings, like state-level secretaries and department heads.
However, JD(U) spokesman Rajeev Ranjan refuted their official tie-up with the party, claiming that they never held formal positions in the office. He took oath on oath that the topmost Muslim leadership, such as Ghulam Gaus and Ghulam Rasool Baliyawi, are still in the party and supported the Bill, referring to it as an instrument of transparency and a ray of hope for the poor.
The Muslim vote in Bihar has never been irrelevant in the history of the state. 17.7% are Muslim and, except for a fleeting instant in 2010, have eschewed the NDA and rallied behind Lalu Yadav’s RJD and its coalition partners. Muslim-Yadav has been the Mahagathbandhan’s support base, as was seen most dramatically during the 2020 assembly polls.
In 2020, though, Dalit votes were observed to weigh the balance in the NDA’s favor at the eleventh hour. Another game-changer was Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, which, despite drawing a blank in 2015, managed to win five seats in 2020, thanks to support from Muslim-majority regions. The Congress later accused AIMIM of splitting the Muslim vote and weakening the Mahagathbandhan.
Bihar Assembly Muslim legislators have been mixed over time. Their peak of 34 was in 1985. Muslims fell to 20 in the next election and have continued at this level ever since. 19 Muslim members were elected to the Assembly in 2020, as many as 24 in 2015 and as many as 19 in 2010. Muslim MLAs in 2005, 2000, and 1995 were 16, 29, and 19, respectively.
In the 2020 elections, Lalu Prasad’s RJD fielded 17 Muslim candidates, eight of whom were elected. The Congress, which was fighting under the Mahagathbandhan banner, fielded ten Muslim candidates and won four seats. CPI (M-L) and BSP were able to elect one Muslim candidate each to the Assembly. JD(U) fielded eleven Muslim candidates and could not win a single seat. BJP, supported by its allies such as HAM and VIP, and none of them. AIMIM, part of a third front of BSP, RLSP, SBSP, and Samajwadi Janata Dal (Democratic), had taken five seats—all Muslim-ruled seats.
Muslims of Bihar are predominantly in the Seemanchal belt, predominantly in Kishanganj, Purnia, Katihar, and Araria districts. The 68% Muslim-majority Kishanganj constituency saw all four Bahadurganj, Thakurganj, Kishanganj, and Kochadhaman Assembly seats go to Muslim candidates from AIMIM, RJD, and Congress.
Katihar, which was 43% Muslim, saw Muslim candidates capturing only two of its seven seats. In Araria, Muslims comprised 42% of the population, yet Congress and AIMIM candidates were ahead in some seats, even though their percentage of votes was lesser than JD(U) and RJD candidates—due to being the result of a split vote that favored some dark horses.
Nitish Kumar’s political strategy has mostly by switching sides, for which he has acquired the nickname of being ‘Palturam’. Though his first term enjoyed broad Muslim support, especially after his resumption of the Bhagalpur riot cases and distancing himself from Narendra Modi in 2010, his adoption of the BJP and the Citizenship (Amendment) Act destroyed it.
By 2020, Nitish’s Muslim support had collapsed. A Carnegie poll discovered that 77% of Muslims cast their votes for the Mahagathbandhan in that election. Nitish appears to understand now that his victory in the Assembly polls may lie in re-winning the Muslim-OBC-EBC formula, but only if he allies with Lalu Yadav.
The BJP, on the other hand, relies on upper caste consolidation, never actually concerned about Muslim representation, it had had just one Muslim MLA in Bihar, and that too in 2010.
The AIMIM acted as a hindrance and presented a new challenge by venturing into the Muslim vote bank. To it is added Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj Party, which declared that it would contest a minimum of 40 Muslim candidates, which itself may also mean even more bifurcation of the Muslim votes.
The Mahagathbandhan might therefore try to mobilize an enormous coalition in its MY-BAAP plank, a Muslim-Yadav, Bahujan, Agda (upper castes), Aadhi Aabadi (women), and the Poor acronym. But that would surely weaken the impact of a concentrated strategy, compared to Akhilesh Yadav’s PDA (Pichda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak) strategy in Uttar Pradesh, appealing to a lesser social coalition.
The combined Muslim and Yadav vote is around 31% of Bihar’s people, a sizable group for the Mahagathbandhan. But split the Muslim vote and, given that many RJD Muslim candidates have lost the last Lok Sabha polls, the coalition’s work looks tough. With Nitish seen set to assume a BJP-straddling stance, the Muslim voter in Bihar has never had its stakes as high.
