LJP crisis: Next political options before Chirag Paswan

Five out of its six Lok Sabha MPs turned rebels against Chirag Paswan and elected Pashupati Kumar Paras as the new leader of the Lok Janshakti Party. LJP MP Paras said that the move was made to save the party.

Patna:All of a sudden, Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) MP Chirag Paswan, who is the son of former Union Minister late Ram Vilas Paswan, finds himself at political crossroads. He finds himself alone in the party which he was heading in the Parliament. He was the chief of the LJP Parliamentary Party.

Bihar’s caste-based politics has seen many satraps rising on the state’s political firmament. Every father has handed over his political legacy to his 'rising son'. Chirag is one of them.

His father Ram Vilas Paswan used to carry the key to power in his pocket and never missed a Ministry at the Centre whosoever formed the government. When he chose his son Chirag to take forward his political legacy, there was little or no opposition. His friends like RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav and Bihar’s current Chief Minister Nitish Kumar used to call him weather scientist, which means that Paswan is always with the party where he gets power, which the late LJP boss lived till the end of his life. However, when Bihar’s political scene changed, senior Paswan himself found marginalized.

POLITICS FROM 2004 TO 2014

In Indian politics, Ram Vilas Paswan played an important role by being a part of almost every government. He was a Minister in the government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. When Congress formed the government after the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, LJP won four seats in Bihar. In the 2009 political battle, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Yadav and Ram Vilas Paswan formed a separate front and contested 128 seats in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. In the agreement they reached upon, a total of 12 seats came in the share of the LJP in Bihar, but the electoral account of the LJP did not open.

After this, the political policies and decisions of Ram Vilas Paswan got a new direction when Chirag Paswan made his presence felt in the party.

Read:|LJP elects Paras as its leader in Parliament

The date of March 3, 2014, was considered the day of the political rise of Ram Vilas Paswan in the strategy of LJP and the politics of Bihar. When the wave of Narendra Modi was sweeping the country, the place where Jaiprakash Narayan had a rally in Muzaffarpur, Narendra Modi had a rally here on March 3, 2014. Jaiprakash Narayan had launched the student movement against Indira Gandhi’s government, which was known as the JP movement. Ram Vilas Paswan became a part of Narendra Modi’s BJP rally. The most discussed topic in politics was that all the credit for bringing Ram Vilas to this platform goes to Chirag Paswan, who was also credited for the party’s performance in the poll.

STRATEGIST OF 2014 & 2019

In the elections held after the agreement with the BJP in 2014, the LJP got 7 seats in its account. Strong election strategy saw six Lok Sabha seats getting into the kitty of the LJP. The LJP had lost one seat in Nalanda. On the other hand, if we talk about 2019, after coming together with the JDU, LJP changed its attitude for the elections.

To persuade Chirag Paswan, BJP chief JP Nadda, Bhoopendra Yadav, all the strong leaders of the BJP came out to persuade him not to rebel, but he did.

The LJP got six seats in the Lok Sabha, while Chirag had proved his political strategy by getting his father Ram Vilas Paswan a Rajya Sabha seat. However, the politics of stubbornness in the party had started knocking other political parties, because the strength on the ground was of Chirag and not of the father. Every aspect of politics was becoming a compulsion of religion in the alliance.

BLUNDERS OF POLITICAL EXTREMISM OF 2020

Even a small success in politics separates one from the ground reality and perhaps the same happened with Chirag Paswan. After failing in reel life, even in real life, he could not hold the lamp on the ground. In the Lok Sabha elections, the seats were won because the people trusted Modi. But in the assembly elections, the LJP was nowhere to be found. In the 2015 assembly elections, Nitish was separated from the BJP. Out of the seats that the LJP had sought for the assembly elections, the BJP gave him 42 seats.

But LJP was able to register a victory in only two seats, although the alliance of Nitish and RJD broke down. The government was again formed in 2017. Even after having two seats, Nitish Kumar gave place to LJP in the Cabinet and made Pashupati Kumar Paras the Minister of Animal Husbandry and Fisheries Department in Bihar.

Read:|LJP rebel faction meets JDU's Lalan Singh in Delhi

In the political season of 2020, Chirag Paswan moved away from the policies of both Nitish Kumar and BJP and put his new political stature in front of Bihar by fielding candidates on 136 seats. However, the people of Bihar destroyed the policies of the LJP and Chirag. The LJP won only one out of 136 seats.

EMBROILED IN ENMITY WITH BJP & JDU IN 2020

In the manner in which Chirag Paswan had behaved in the 2020 assembly elections, Chirag turned hostile to both the JDU and the BJP. It was only after the election results that it came to light that Chirag Paswan had directly harmed the JDU in more than two dozen seats. However, the BJP had to make up for it because Nitish Kumar did not want to become the Chief Minister after the results. He was also displeased with the BJP’s Chirag politics. At the request of Narendra Modi, he became the CM but speculations started brewing that the coming days are not good for Chirag Paswan’s politics. It happened that Chirag’s own extreme politics forced his uncle Paras as well as the rest of the party’s MPs to rebel against his policies on June 14, 2021. The result was that Chirag Paswan stepped down as the chairman of the LJP Parliamentary Board. Also, apart from Chirag, the remaining MPs made his uncle Pashupatinath Paras the president of the party.

OPTIONS BEFORE CHIRAG

After the break-up at the party, now one thing is clear -- Chirag Paswan will have to work with a new strategy. There is no chance that Chirag will be able to do a lot in the LJP.

What are the options left for Chirag Paswan?

1. He can approach Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla with a complaint that how the party MPs removed as the LJP Parliamentary president is unconstitutional. However, he may not get any big relief in this regard.

2. Chirag Paswan can also approach the Election Commission, but political experts say that he will not get much relief here as well.

3. Chirag Paswan can tie up with other political parties for political stability.

4. This option is also open to him that there should be an agreement between Tejashwi Yadav and Chirag Paswan in Bihar. This option is the best and strongest for Chirag Paswan because by going with the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Chirag Paswan can articulate his voice of protest against his uncle and Nitish Kumar in a louder voice.

CHIRAG COULDN’T SAVE HIS HOUSE & HIS LOVED ONES

When Chirag Paswan came into politics to handle his father’s legacy, the discussion started that as easily Ram Vilas Paswan was settled on the political ground and from where he rose to shine on the horizon of politics, Chirag Paswan would take forward his legacy. But Chirag Paswan could not live up to the policies of Ram Vilas Paswan. Sadhu Paswan, the eldest son-in-law of Ram Vilas Paswan, had first accused Chirag Paswan of asking him money for getting a ticket. The controversy regarding Ram Vilas Paswan’s first wife had also come to the fore in public. The two younger brothers of Ram Vilas Paswan had nothing to do with the strategy for the party. Even if a draft was given from his side, then Chirag Paswan would not even listen to them. Chirag Paswan could not save the democratic system and the values that one has to maintain in public life, and as a result, the love of the entire party and the family was shattered.

Read:|LJP MPs join hands against Chirag Paswan

In Bihar, Pashupati Nath Paras is the new commander of the LJP after the party slipped out of the hands of Chirag Paswan. It is believed that the LJP is still in the hands of Ram Vilas Paswan’s relatives. Now the need is that how the opposition has come between the loved ones, what politics does Chirag do to remove it and end all these things, by lighting a new flame of politics. He has the challenge to give a new political position to the party based on his father’s legacy.