Tag Archives: Elections

Since February, a group of mostly lifelong BJP voters from the Brahmin community has been meeting in Lucknow to plan the party’s defeat in Uttar Pradesh. They have formed the Rashtriya Adhikar Morcha (RAM), led by former judicial officer Alankar Agnihotri, who resigned in February over the University Grants Commission’s proposed equity rules. Agnihotri has announced that RAM will contest 150 seats in the 2027 Assembly elections and possibly extend unconditional support to Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in the remaining 253. The offer puts the BSP in an awkward position: a party established to challenge upper-caste dominance is being proposed as a vehicle for Brahmins disaffected with the BJP, and the proposal cuts against Mayawati’s stated preference for contesting elections independently.

In his speech “Two Serious Mistakes That Killed the Dalit Movement,” delivered at the BAMCEF Karnataka State Convention in Gulbarga on 22 November 2009, V. T. Rajshekar criticised the Dalit movement’s excessive concentration on electoral politics. The BSP, now courted by the community it was founded to oppose, shows where that concentration can lead.

On 29 January, the Supreme Court stayed the University Grants Commission’s Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions Regulations, 2026, directing that the 2012 regulations remain in force while the legal challenge proceeds. The new rules followed a legal campaign initiated in 2019 for stronger protections against caste discrimination in higher education. Mayawati welcomed the stay, arguing that the UGC should have consulted all stakeholders and ensured adequate representation for upper-caste members on inquiry committees. Her position on the rules is close to Agnihotri’s own objection to them, which gives RAM one reason to look to the BSP.

Mayawati has spoken forcefully against caste discrimination when responding to particular incidents. On 14 August, she condemned the purification of a stage in Haldwani after Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge addressed a rally there, demanding action against those responsible. She also criticised RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’s suggestion that beneficiaries who no longer need reservations should give them up. These interventions show that the BSP continues to invoke its anti-caste politics but has been notably absent from social movements that have defined the times.

Mayawati’s electoral strategy has increasingly centred on recovering upper-caste support. On her 70th birthday on 15 January, she said the BSP would contest elections independently, leaving open the possibility of future alliances if partners could transfer their votes to the party. She subsequently renewed her outreach to Brahmins, drawing on the BSP’s 2007 Uttar Pradesh victory, when it won 206 Assembly seats with 30.43 per cent of the vote. That coalition brought Brahmin voters into an electoral arrangement with Dalits under the slogan of Sarvajan politics. The strategy now faces a different political landscape. On 5 August, SP president Akhilesh Yadav said that the “P” in his PDA formula, originally standing for Pichhde, Dalit, Alpsankhyak (backward classes, Dalits and minorities), would also include Pandits. At the local level, however, Brahmin discontent with the BJP does not necessarily translate into support for the BSP. Brahmin voters distinguish their dissatisfaction with Narendra Modi from their views of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. OBC and Scheduled Caste villagers described local Brahmin political dominance as a source of pressure on land and labour, including allegations that influential figures enabled below-minimum-wage payments and land seizures. The interests of Brahmin voters whom the BSP hopes to attract may therefore conflict with the demands of Dalit and OBC communities whose support the party also needs.

The BSP’s electoral decline has made the coalition issue more urgent. After the death of its lone Uttar Pradesh MLA, Uma Shankar Singh, on 5 August, the party was left without a representative in the state Assembly. It had already lost all its Lok Sabha seats in the 2024 general election, when its Uttar Pradesh vote share fell to 9.39 per cent, against the SP’s 33.59 per cent. Its organisational decisions have also exposed the concentration of authority around Mayawati. In September, she removed her nephew Akash Anand from his national convenor position and expelled him from the party, before appointing his younger brother Ishan to the post. After Akash apologised publicly on 2 October, Mayawati reinstated him and restored his position on 5 October. The repeated reversals have left senior party responsibilities dependent on Mayawati’s personal decisions. The BSP also failed to win a seat in the May 2026 Assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu or Kerala, polling less than one per cent in each state. In Bihar’s 2025 Assembly election, it won one seat. Its response to the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Uttar Pradesh followed the same pattern of distance from other Opposition parties. The final roll, published on 10 April, contained 13.39 crore electors, down from 15.44 crore before the exercise; more than 2.04 crore names had been removed, while approximately 84 lakh were added during the claims-and-objections period. Mayawati called for more time to protect poor people and migrants from exclusion, but the BSP did not join the wider Opposition campaign against the revision. These developments point to a party whose electoral reach and organisational depth have contracted while its leadership remains committed to controlling its political direction independently. Rajshekar described this vulnerability in a movement that puts office ahead of institutions of its own.

Chandrashekhar Azad’s Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) has pursued a different route, combining street mobilisation with electoral expansion. Azad first gained prominence through the Bhim Army, founded in 2015 to organise Dalit communities against caste discrimination and violence. His participation in protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and National Register of Citizens, the 2020 Hathras case and other caste atrocities established him as a Dalit activist before he entered Parliament by winning the Nagina Lok Sabha seat in 2024 with 5.12 lakh votes. In July 2026, he announced plans for a political front outside both the BJP-led NDA and the INDIA bloc. His party subsequently named 45 constituency in-charges for the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections: 18 from Scheduled Castes, 16 from OBCs, 10 Muslims and one Sikh. The composition signals an effort to build a wider Bahujan constituency. Mayawati has accused Chandrashekhar Azad of undermining the BSP and Bahujan unity, portraying him and other rival leaders as opportunists seeking political mileage from Dalit issues, while Azad has continued to raise issues concerning caste violence and the exclusion of marginalised voters. His trajectory shows how mobilisation outside electoral institutions can create a route into Parliament. Aazad Samaj Party must now turn Chandrashekhar Azad’s individual electoral presence into an enduring political organisation rooted in Dalit movements and capable of building a broader political base.

In Tamil Nadu, the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK), led by Thol Thirumavalavan, won two Assembly seats in the 2026 election as part of the DMK-led alliance. After Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) emerged as the single-largest party with 108 seats but fell short of a majority, reports citing VCK sources said the party had discussed seeking the deputy chief minister’s post for Thirumavalavan and cabinet positions for its legislators if it joined a TVK government. Thirumavalavan subsequently announced unconditional outside support for TVK, saying the aim was to prevent President’s Rule, while maintaining that VCK would remain in the DMK-led alliance and would not join the government. The shift from reported discussions over a share in power to support without government participation leaves VCK with a problem: how a Dalit party can translate its electoral presence into executive influence while preserving its independent political position.

In Maharashtra, Prakash Ambedkar’s Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) has sought to rebuild its electoral position through alliances and legal challenges concerning voting rights. After winning no seats in the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly election or the 2024 Lok Sabha election, it allied with Congress for the January 2026 municipal elections but failed to win a seat in Mumbai’s Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation or Nanded-Waghala; it won four seats in Latur. The party has also challenged Maharashtra’s Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. In October, the Bombay High Court deferred its hearing on a petition filed by two Mumbai residents, including VBA youth president Sagar Ramesh Gawai, after being told that related questions were before the Supreme Court. The petition sought safeguards against voter exclusion and an interim direction preventing deletions from the state’s rolls. Prakash Ambedkar has also urged Rahul Gandhi to bring opposition parties and organisations together to challenge the Election Commission’s process. Yet during the November 2024 Maharashtra Assembly election, he declared that the VBA would support whichever party or alliance could form the government, adding, “We will choose power!” This emphasis on access to power sits uneasily with his appeal for opposition unity around the electoral-roll issue. Rajshekar’s criticism of a movement that concentrates on office applies to this emphasis. If the VBA seeks to build an independent political force, its alliance strategy has to reconcile electoral bargaining with the causes it claims to represent.

Within the BJP-led NDA, Chirag Paswan and Jitan Ram Manjhi have clashed over how Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe reservations should be distributed. On 29 August 2026, Paswan, the chief of the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas), demanded that Manjhi and his son, Bihar minister Santosh Kumar Suman, resign over their support for sub-classification and the creamy-layer principle. Manjhi, founder of the Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) and a member of the Musahar community, has argued that communities such as Musahars, Bhuiyas, Nats and Doms remain underrepresented and need a greater share of existing quotas. Paswan rejected sub-quotas, arguing that they would divide Dalits and weaken their collective position. In its August 2024 judgment in State of Punjab v. Davinder Singh, the Supreme Court permitted states to sub-classify SC and ST reservations on the basis of evidence of unequal representation.

Ramdas Athawale’s Republican Party of India (Athawale), another NDA ally, has called for any decision on sub-classification of Scheduled Caste reservations to follow the publication of caste census data. Athawale has argued that the population of individual SC communities should guide the distribution of Maharashtra’s 13 per cent quota, raising particular concerns about the Matang community. His position differs from Paswan’s opposition to sub-quotas. Athawale has also faced repeated disputes over the RPI(A)’s share of electoral opportunities within the BJP-led alliance. The BJP and Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena excluded the party from their seat-sharing agreement for the January 2026 Mumbai civic elections, prompting Athawale to accuse them of betraying the alliance; the RPI(A) subsequently fielded candidates independently in Mumbai. Ahead of the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, Athawale has demanded 25 seats for his party and said it would contest independently if an agreement with the BJP failed. His continued presence in the Union government has not secured his party a dependable share of electoral space, leaving it to negotiate its position with a much larger ally.

The fortunes of these parties unfold alongside a much wider field of Ambedkarite and anti-caste organising. At the University of Hyderabad, the Ambedkar Students’ Association (ASA) launched an indefinite relay hunger strike in May after the administration imposed a ₹5,000 fine on a student accused of assaulting and subjecting Dalit student Anuj Kumar to casteist abuse. ASA demanded the release of a fact-finding committee report and stronger disciplinary action, arguing that the punishment failed to address the seriousness of the allegations. Outside electoral politics, Dalit and Bahujan mobilisation has continued around the distribution of reservations, caste discrimination within institutions and access to land. In Maharashtra, Ambedkarite organisations representing 59 Scheduled Caste communities mobilised against the proposed sub-categorisation of SC reservations, demanding withdrawal of the Badar Committee report. In Bihar, the Aarakshan Badhao, Samvidhan Bachao Sangharsh Samiti marched in Patna to demand restoration of the 65% reservation quota struck down by the Patna High Court, alongside reservation in private-sector employment and government contracts. The All India Independent Scheduled Castes Association (AIISCA), led by Rahul Sonpimple, has taken the demand for private-sector reservation beyond individual states, announcing a nationwide campaign for reservation in private employment and private educational institutions. The issue of institutional accountability has also driven sustained mobilisation in Mumbai after IIT Bombay student Sahil Wakode’s death. AIISCA, Aamchi Padhai Aamchi Ladhai, the Progressive Students Union and the Samyak Vidyarthi Andolan have joined protests demanding an independent inquiry into his family’s allegations of caste discrimination and harassment. Activists formed a Justice for Sahil Joint Action Committee at Azad Maidan, taking the demand beyond the campus. Elsewhere, the Kula Vivaksha Vyatireka Porata Sangham and Dalit Shoshan Mukti Manch in Andhra Pradesh have mobilised over land rights and living conditions in Dalit settlements. Dalit Christians have organised around caste-based exclusion from state protections: on 10 August, organisations marked Black Day with protests demanding Scheduled Caste status. The Telangana Christian Joint Action Committee demonstrated at Jantar Mantar, while the Vellore Catholic Diocese SC/ST Committee, the CSI Church’s Vellore Diocese and the All Minorities Federation organised a protest involving more than 400 people in Vellore. These campaigns differ in their immediate demands, yet each has involved organised pressure on institutions and governments over decisions affecting Dalit and marginalised communities. Rajshekar asked for institutions of the community’s own; these campaigns mostly press existing ones.

The BSP’s decline and the relative irrelevance of Dalit parties more broadly sit alongside the continuing activity of anti-caste organisations, and the parties that have gained ground are those doing movement-style work. Together these point to a distinction between electoral strength and the capacity to organise politically. Electoral results show whether a party can win seats and exercise power, but they do not capture the ability of a movement to mobilise communities or force institutions to answer for caste discrimination. The BSP’s rise rested on an organisation that mobilised Dalit voters and brought other Bahujan communities into a wider political coalition. Its decline shows what happens when electoral strategy outlasts the organisational base that once sustained it. Azad, Thirumavalavan, Prakash Ambedkar and Athawale have pursued different routes to representation, from independent mobilisation to alliances with larger parties. Their trajectories however show the fragile possibilities of converting electoral presence into independent political power.

V. T. Rajshekar argued that electoral victories could not sustain a Bahujan movement without independent institutions and political education rooted in the community. The campaigns around reservations and caste discrimination suggest that social movements may offer greater scope for political change than electoral parties currently do. Dalit and anti-caste communities continue today to organise collectively and challenge the institutions that sustain caste, even as the future relationship between these movements and electoral politics remains unresolved.

Archival Note

Published in 2006 during A. P. J. Abdul Kalam’s presidency in Vol. 25, Issue No. 24 (16/12/2006), this article is less a profile of Kalam than a reflection on the politics of minority representation. V.T. Rajshekhar asks why some members of historically oppressed groups come to be celebrated by dominant political establishments while others remain excluded or viewed with suspicion. These ideas remain urgent over the last decade with a Dalit and an Adivasi president from the Hindu nationalist party occupying the post.

The article is reproduced here in full. Read today, it can also be situated within a wider discussion about the distinction often drawn between the “good” and the “bad” Muslim—a distinction that is used globally as a liberal strategy to tame minority political power.

The complete, unabridged article is available in the Dalit Voice archives: https://dalitvoice.net/why-upper-castes-are-all-praise-for-abdul-kalam-as-a-good-man/

Why Upper Castes Are All Praise For Abdul Kalam As “A Good Man”? 

President Abdul Kalam, the dark-looking, vegetarian Tamil bachelor who is never invited by any Muslim organisation anywhere in India, is called a “good man” by our Brahminical rulers. Maybe he is called good because he has been good to them.

We were all praise for Kalam when he was a scientist in the Defence Department. We then called him “India’s only scientist”. All other upper-caste “scientists” had no achievement to their credit. Collectively, they did a lot of harm to the poor Kalam. Despite all the pinpricks, Kalam went up by his sheer “merit and efficiency”, which no other Brahmin scientist possessed.

MEDIOCRITY GLORIFIED

We have not made any comment on him after he became the President of India. Because, no. 1, we had never heard him speaking face to face. No. 2, out of respect for a Muslim.

But we have read a lot of his speeches, which made no sense. We asked many people their opinion. They gave the same opinion.

Mediocrity is always glorified in this vast intellectual desert called India.

For the first time, we heard him at the Tehelka “Summit of the Powerless”, which he inaugurated in Delhi on Nov. 20, 2006. As usual, the speech made no sense to us or any comrades with us.

HELPED FIGHT PAKISTAN?

His days as a scientist (he was no doubt brilliant) were fully exploited by the upper castes to manufacture rockets, in which he was an expert. Do rockets feed India’s hungry millions? If not, why was he praised and paraded by the fellow scientists, all from the upper castes? Because rockets helped threaten the enemy. Who is India’s enemy? Of course, Pakistan, which is a Muslim country. Did Muslim Kalam help fight Muslims? Was he praised for this?

In other words, the hungry millions did not get any relief from Kalam’s scientific experiments. He catered to the interests of the Brahminical rulers, who considered Pakistan (read Muslim) as their enemy.

In his speech at the Tehelka function, he praised the cock-and-bull story called the Ramayana (Read Dr. Ambedkar’s book Riddle of Rama & Krishna. DSA, 1995) and the Tamil Brahmin religious leader Ramanujacharya. These are music to Brahminical ears.

WHY ALL HIS GRAND “PLANS” IGNORED?

Kalam, as the President, had visited several places and delivered scores of speeches presenting his grand “plans to reduce poverty in 10 years”. The upper castes cheered him but did not implement a single “plan”.

Why did his “plans” always fall on deaf ears? Because these were all economic in content, while the over 85% of India suffered from a disease that was essentially social and cultural in content. That is why Kalam was simply ignored. His most publicised plan was the “PURA Project”. Did anybody implement his project? We have no information.

Brahmins praised him but silently laughed at him. They are not bloody fools to select him as President unless they have made sure that he would serve their interests.

Prime Minister Vajpayee, heading the sworn anti-Muslim party of BJP, wanted an obedient, harmless Muslim as head of state to decorate the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

PRAISE FOR GANDHI KILLERS

How big a simpleton he is could be made out from his profuse praise for a top RSS terrorist leader, Nanaji Deshmukh. He said he had visited Nanaji’s project in MP and was much impressed by the socio-cultural changes it brought about.

How could the RSS be interested in socio-cultural revolution? Maybe Nanaji’s multi-million-rupee experiment converting the MP tribals into good “Hindus”, meaning slaves, impressed him. RSS is doing such socio-cultural experiments in all tribal belts.

Nanaji is senior to Vaidik Vajpayee. He resigned as Union Cabinet Minister to go into the MP forest to continue his “socio-cultural experiment” of enslaving the tribals. How selfless and dedicated he must be. RSS has hundreds of such leaders and workers.

Kalam has been praised for such work. That means even such a brilliant scientist can be taken for a ride by the Brahminical people.

As he was going out after his speech, we caught hold of his hand and questioned his praise of a Hindu terrorist leader.

His answer was: “What if he is an RSS man? He is doing good work.” We said: “RSS killed Gandhi, whom you praised many times in your speech.” He simply walked away without answering.

Brahminical India gets the President it deserves and the Prime Minister it deserves.

Archival Note

Delivered at a BAMCEF state convention in Gulbarga (now Kalaburagi) in November 2009, this speech reflects V.T. Rajshekhar’s thinking at a particular moment in the history of the anti-caste movement. While some of its references and political judgments are rooted in that context, its central argument continues to provoke debate: what enables oppressed communities to build lasting power?

The version reproduced below has been abridged for contemporary readers. The overall argument and structure have been retained, while passages closely tied to the political context of 2009, repeated arguments, and material of primarily historical interest have been omitted. The focus remains on the speech’s two central themes: the responsibility of educated Bahujans to strengthen collective institutions, and the argument that electoral success alone cannot sustain social transformation without intellectual, organisational, and cultural power.

The complete, unabridged speech is available in the Dalit Voice archives: https://dalitvoice.net/two-serious-mistakes-that-killed-dalit-movement/

Two Serious Mistakes That Killed the Dalit Movement

Abridged from a speech delivered at the BAMCEF Karnataka State Convention, Gulbarga, November 22, 2009

Brother Waman Meshram and brothers and sisters of the Bahujan Samaj,

Thank you for inviting me to inaugurate the first Karnataka state convention of BAMCEF at Gulbarga.

We have watched the steady growth of BAMCEF under the leadership of Brother Waman Meshram. Organising educated employees is never easy, yet BAMCEF has emerged as one of the country’s most significant Bahujan organisations. It is fitting that this convention is being held in Gulbarga, a region associated with the legacy of Shyam Sundar, whose work left a lasting mark on anti-caste politics.

Today I wish to speak about two questions that I believe have deeply affected the Bahujan movement.

The first concerns the educated Dalits who have benefited from constitutional safeguards and reservations.

The second concerns the widespread belief that political power alone can transform society.

The First Mistake

Reservations opened opportunities that were denied to our people for generations. But education and employment were never meant to be ends in themselves. Babasaheb Ambedkar saw them as instruments for the emancipation of the entire community.

Over the years, however, I have watched with concern as many educated Dalits achieved personal success but drifted away from the larger movement. Babasaheb himself warned that educated Dalits should not forget the people from whom they came.

Our communities need educated people who build institutions, mentor younger generations, strengthen organisations, write, teach, and remain accountable to society. Without that commitment, education risks becoming only a means of individual advancement.

This is why BAMCEF matters. Organising educated Bahujans into a socially conscious force is difficult, but it is indispensable if education is to become a source of collective strength rather than individual mobility.

The Second Mistake

Much has been said about political power being the key to social progress. Electoral representation is important, but we must ask whether elections alone are sufficient to transform deeply unequal social structures.

Political office without organised social strength is fragile. Governments come and go. Lasting change requires a society that is organised, politically conscious, and capable of sustaining its own institutions.

Those who dominate society do not rely only on elections. They exercise influence through education, the media, the bureaucracy, finance, and other institutions. If we neglect these spheres while concentrating only on electoral politics, our victories will remain temporary.

Political power is not given but taken. To secure it requires strength—not merely physical strength, but intellectual strength.

This is why independent Bahujan media is not a luxury but a necessity. A movement that depends entirely on others to tell its story cannot shape its own future.

What is needed first is intellectual strength. We must produce honest intellectuals, strengthen our organisations, build institutions, and develop leadership that remains rooted in the community.

Political power becomes meaningful only when it rests upon an organised and self-confident society.

That is the challenge before us.

Thank you.

Jai Bhim!

Nitish Kumar has filed his nomination for the Rajya Sabha, a move that effectively ends his nearly two-decade-long tenure as Bihar’s chief minister and opens the way for a chief minister from the Bharatiya Janata Party for the first time in the state’s history. The decision comes just four months after Kumar took oath for his tenth term in November. While the timing has surprised observers, leaders within the ruling coalition say the shift has been under discussion for some time. The move would allow the 75-year-old Janata Dal (United) leader to transition to Parliament while maintaining the alliance between the Janata Dal (United) and the BJP in Bihar. The development is likely to reshape the state’s political balance, not only because of the leadership change but also because of what Kumar’s departure from the chief minister’s post represents in the longer trajectory of Bihar’s caste politics.

Speculation about Kumar’s future had intensified in recent months after several public appearances in which he appeared visibly fatigued circulated widely on social media. Opposition leaders from the Rashtriya Janata Dal, including Tejashwi Yadav, repeatedly questioned whether the chief minister was physically able to continue in office. Within the ruling coalition, moving Kumar to the Rajya Sabha appears to be a way to ease the pressure created by those questions while keeping him within the national political structure.

The shift also fulfils a long-standing personal milestone. Kumar has previously served in the Bihar legislative assembly, the legislative council and the Lok Sabha. A Rajya Sabha term would make him one of the few leaders from Bihar to have served in all four legislative houses, a distinction already held by figures such as Lalu Prasad Yadav and the late Sushil Kumar Modi.

Kumar’s exit from the chief minister’s post marks the closing of a political chapter that began in the 1990s, when backward-caste leaders began to dominate Bihar’s electoral landscape. Born into a Kurmi family in Nalanda district, Kumar’s political career developed within the socialist movements that drew heavily from the ideas of Ram Manohar Lohia and the anti-Emergency mobilisations of the 1970s. These movements encouraged greater political participation by Other Backward Classes, many of whom had historically been excluded from positions of power in the state. Alongside leaders such as Lalu Prasad Yadav and Ram Vilas Paswan, Kumar emerged from that period as part of a generation that reconfigured Bihar’s social coalitions. Their rise marked a shift away from the earlier dominance of upper-caste political elites.

However, backward-caste politics in Bihar was never a single unified bloc. Rivalries between dominant OBC communities often shaped political competition. While Lalu Prasad Yadav’s base rested largely among Yadav voters, Kumar’s support historically drew more from Kurmi and other non-Yadav OBC groups. This fragmentation created space for different political formations to assemble caste alliances in distinct ways.

One of Kumar’s most significant political strategies during his years as chief minister was the attempt to build a broader coalition among smaller caste groups that had limited representation in state politics. His government placed particular emphasis on communities categorised as Extremely Backward Classes, or EBCs, a grouping that includes dozens of smaller OBC communities that historically lacked the electoral strength of dominant castes such as Yadavs or Kurmis. The administration also introduced the category of “Mahadalits”, identifying the most marginalised Scheduled Caste communities and designing targeted welfare programmes for them. All Scheduled Castes except the Paswan community were included in this classification. These policies were framed as attempts to direct state welfare towards the most marginalised communities, but they also had clear political implications. By building support among EBC and Mahadalit groups, Kumar created a support base that could counterbalance the influence of the RJD’s traditional Yadav-Muslim coalition.

Election studies by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies have repeatedly shown how caste blocs in Bihar align with particular political parties. Upper-caste voters have historically leaned strongly towards the BJP, while the JD(U) has often drawn support from EBC communities and segments of the OBC electorate.

Kumar’s tenure also revealed the limits and tensions within caste-based representation in the state. In 2014, after the JD(U)’s poor performance in the parliamentary elections, Kumar stepped down as chief minister and appointed the Dalit leader Jitan Ram Manjhi as his successor. The decision was initially seen as a significant moment for Dalit representation in Bihar’s executive leadership. However, Manjhi later accused Kumar of continuing to control the government from behind the scenes. The conflict between the two leaders eventually led to Manjhi’s removal and Kumar’s return to the chief minister’s post. The episode illustrated the complicated dynamics of caste representation within party structures, where symbolic leadership positions can still operate within established political hierarchies.

If Kumar steps aside as expected, the BJP will lead the state government for the first time despite having been part of ruling coalitions in Bihar for several years. Several names are being discussed as potential successors. These include deputy chief minister Samrat Choudhary, union minister Nityanand Rai and senior BJP leader Dilip Kumar Jaiswal. Party leaders, however, have not publicly indicated a final choice. Each of these leaders represents different caste constituencies within the BJP’s support base, highlighting the continuing importance of caste arithmetic in leadership decisions.

The BJP’s growth in Bihar over the past decade has depended heavily on consolidating upper-caste voters while expanding its reach among sections of OBC and EBC communities. A chief minister from the party could further alter the balance within the ruling alliance, where Kumar’s JD(U) has historically held the top position despite being the smaller partner in electoral terms.

Kumar’s move to the Rajya Sabha does not necessarily mean an immediate withdrawal from active politics. Even from Parliament, he may continue to influence the direction of his party and its alliance with the BJP. At the same time, the shift symbolises a generational change in Bihar’s leadership. With Kumar stepping away from the chief minister’s office, that phase of Bihar’s political history appears to be drawing to a close.

What replaces it will depend on how the state’s evolving caste coalitions are reorganised in the coming years. Even as new leaders emerge, the underlying structures of representation that shaped Bihar’s politics for decades, alliances among OBC, EBC and Dalit communities, are likely to remain central to its electoral contests.

The transition therefore raises questions about how the caste coalitions that shaped Bihar’s politics over the past three decades will evolve in the coming years. Kumar’s political strategy rested on carefully balancing multiple social blocs: the Kurmi–Koeri alliance often referred to as the “Luv-Kush” combine, support from Extremely Backward Classes, and welfare outreach to Mahadalit communities. Maintaining that equilibrium will be central to the BJP’s calculations as it moves to lead the government. Political observers note that preserving this social coalition will likely influence both the choice of chief minister and the broader composition of the cabinet. Any disruption to this balance risks unsettling a political arrangement that has allowed the JD(U)–BJP alliance to remain competitive against the Rashtriya Janata Dal’s Yadav-Muslim base.

At the same time, the transition is likely to sharpen questions within Bihar’s anti-caste movements about the limits of representation within electoral politics. While the post-Mandal period significantly expanded the presence of OBC leaders in government, political power has often remained concentrated among a few dominant caste blocs. Many smaller OBC groups, Dalit communities outside established political bases, and landless labouring populations continue to rely on shifting alliances for visibility within party structures. With Nitish Kumar stepping aside after nearly two decades as chief minister, the moment may prompt renewed debate about whether Bihar’s politics can move beyond managing caste coalitions toward broader and more substantive forms of social representation.

Praveen Kumar is an Ambedkarite political observer from Bihar.