Parivartan rally: Modi finally wakes up to his mistakes in Bihar polls

During the first three legs of NDA's Parivartan rally, if one felt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had deflected from his main agenda of development, he finally made a mid-way course correction. During the last leg in Bhagalpur on September 1, Modi sought to lift political discourse away from personal barbs. A close scrutiny of PM's four speeches, the last one coming within 48 hours of the Swabhiman rally of JDU-RJD-Congress' grand alliance, suggests how the PM has tweaked his strategy to live up to the image of a "development man" which he has been consciously trying to build over the years.

DNA and Bimaru barbs

While kicking off the Parivartan rally in Muzaffarpur on July 25, Modi made a scathing personal attack on Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar. He accused Nitish of "ditching" leaders like George Fernandes, Sushil Modi and Jitan Ram Manjhi as also the BJP and said: "Iss aadmi kaa DNA hi kharab hai." (This man's DNA is poor.) The Bihar CM sought to make a huge issue out of the "DNA" barb. By taking a leaf out of Modi's "Gujarati asmita (pride)", Nitish sought to turn the table on him and converted it to "Bihari swabhiman (self-respect)". Modi's personal attack on Nitish boomeranged. His statement became controversial.

Then on August 9 during his Gaya leg of Parivartan rally, Modi promised to remove the "Bimaru tag" from Bihar if BJP was voted to power in the state. Nitish and RJD chief Lalu Prasad politicised this jibe as well and, clubbing it with the DNA remark, planned the Swabhiman rally accordingly. Modi attempted at explaining but the development agenda of the BJP seemed to derail in the process. Hence, in the Bhagalpur rally, there was neither DNA nor Bimaru remark. Modi had moved on. There was only development talk.

During the Swabhiman rally, Lalu sought to bring down the level of political discourse to caste and religion by speaking of the unity of Yadavs and OBC-Muslim consolidation. Quite strategically, Modi desisted from retorting to the Yadav strongman. He did not wish the development agenda to be upstaged and, hence, he talked only of development. He even explicitly said so in Bhagalpur. "They ridiculed my package but realised in two-three days that people have seen through their game. So they were forced to announce their own development package. I am very happy that development has become a poll issue in Bihar."

Land Acquisition Bill

The BJP is on the defensive over the crucial Land Ordinance, which it promulgated on three occasions since December 31, 2014 but allowed it to lapse on August 31 in the wake of stiff resistance from the Opposition, particularly Congress, and even its own allies during the last monsoon session of Parliament. The Opposition sought to drive home the point that the 2015 Land Bill was anti-farmer. The BJP realised that the issue will impact the elections in predominantly agrarian Bihar if the Centre promulgated it for the fourth time. Taking a corrective measure and trying to minimise the damage, Modi did not make it a prestige issue and backtracked in view of the upcoming crucial polls in the eastern state.

Alliance dharma

Though the Parivartan rally was organised under the banner of NDA, comprising Union consumer affairs minister Ramvilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), Union minister of state for human resource development Upendra Kushwaha's Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) and former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM), BJP's alliance partners felt they were being given the short-shrift. The venues had flags mostly of the BJP and the leaders of the alliance parties did not get opportunity to speak in the rallies. A meeting of the NDA leaders took place in the national capital on August 31 to settle the issue. Their grievance was addressed to in the Bhagalpur rally.