Why is former Chief Minister and Hindustani Awam Morcha founder Jitan Ram Manjhi contesting Imamaganj constituency apart from his traditional Makhdoompur seatIJ To defeat the ‘Rakshas’ (devil), he and his supporters say. And the ‘Rakshash’ is none other than Bihar Assembly Speaker Uday Narain Chaudhary of JD(U) who is representing Imamganj since 1990.
Manjhi in fact snatched this seat from the BJP’s kitty and made it a prestige issue to contest it. Manjhi, who is a star campaigner of the NDA, frequents this constituency almost every other day to keep his supporters energised.
The people, however, take Manjhi as a ‘guest artist’ and talk about his political inconsistency. “Nobody is sure when he will change the side,” says Saifganj mukhiya Ranjit Kumar Verma.
Chaudhary does not know why Manjhi calls him Rakshash. “I don’t treat him as my enemy,” he says while campaigning in this interior area of his Naxalite-hit constituency going to vote on October 16. “He may be angry because I had disqualified a few JD(U) MlAs who turned out to be Manjhi’s supporters,” Chaudhary adds. Here the fight is straight and Chaudhary, who has a unique distinction of holding the office of Assembly Speaker for ten years, seems to have an edge because of the caste chemistry of the constituency.
Manjhi supporters, however, claim a strong anti-incumbency factor against Chaudhary. “He always won with very slender margin. People are more cautious towards development,” says former MlC Anuj Singh, who till recently was Chaudhary follower. “We forced Manjhi to come here and defeat him,” adds Sudhir Kumar Sharma of Raniganj at Manjhi’s election office at Banke Bazar.
“Imamganj has 2.52 lakh voters of which Koeri, Yadav and Musahar are 50,000 each followed by 40,000 Muslims and 15,000 EBCs,” calculates Primary Agriculture Cooperative Society president of Banke Bazar Raghunath Yadav. Sipping tea at a roadside tea stall Yadav, a staunch supporter of lalu Prasad who opposed Chaudhary in most of the previous polls, claims Koeri, Yadav and Muslims and EBCs are siding with Chaudhary and in all likelihood will get half of Mahadalit votes.