“ She knows there’s no success like failure
And that failure’s no success at all”
Bob Dylan wrote these lines (“Love Minus Zero/ No Limit”) in 1965. More than half a century later, they ring true in Bihar. Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Lalu Prasad is certainly no Dylan. He is also neither Nelson Mandela, nor B.R. Ambedkar with whom he tried to draw a parallel soon after his arrest following conviction by a special Central Bureau of Investigation court in Ranchi in the second fodder scam case. But Dylan’s words ring true for Mr. Prasad: he has seen many failures turn into successes and successes morph into failures.
Mr. Prasad is back in jail for the eighth time, even as pundits are busy charting out possible electoral alliances in Bihar. If Mr. Prasad’s political trajectory is anything to go by, jail bars have never affected his electoral fortunes. Delhi University professor and national spokesperson of the RJD, Manoj Jha, asserts that the RJD’s structure will only become “robust”, and that the party will have a larger social constituency in time for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. “It is now a direct battle between the RJD and the BJP. Nitish Kumar will be relegated to a footnote in Bihar politics,” he says.
The equation in Bihar is far more complex though.The impact of Mr. Prasad’s conviction will be on the party, but also beyond. There are two questions that arise from his conviction. One, can his son and heir apparent, Tejashwi Yadav, keep the party intact, the cadre energised, and the voters enchanted, especially as the Enforcement Directorate is trying to bring cases against him and other family members under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act? And two, does the conviction jeopardise Mr. Prasad’s place in the Opposition? Barring an oblique comment from the Congress, most of the Opposition parties have remained mum on the conviction.
The RJD is losing no time in trying to convince people that Mr. Prasad is being targeted, shouting slogans like “ Lalu ko jail, Jagannath ko bail, dekho Modi sarkar ka khel (Lalu goes to jail, Jagannath gets bail, look at how the Modi government is playing games).” Disqualified Janata Dal (United) MP Ali Anwar says: “They acquitted a pandit (former Bihar Chief Minister Jagannath Mishra) and convicted a Yadav. This is exactly the narrative that Mr. Prasad has been propagating all along. It will resound with the voters.”
In October 2013, Mr. Prasad was convicted in the the first fodder scam case and sentenced to five years in prison. Much was written about how the grounds had been cleared for Mr. Kumar, who broke away from a 17-year alliance with the BJP, to rule alone. But Mr. Prasad came back into the spotlight when he and Mr. Kumar announced the Mahagathbandhan to halt the BJP’s juggernaut. Then, Mr. Kumar walked out of the alliance to join hands with the BJP once again and Mr. Prasad is once again out of power. For now.
