Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s latest trick to raise the reservation percentage from 50 to 75 percent is considered a deft political move by the veteran leader at a time when the 2024 Lok Sabha elections are just a few months ahead. The strategy is quite in accordance with the opposition alliance – INDIA – which wants to play caste card to defeat the Hindutva card of the BJP. Despite the fact that RSS is not in favour of any long-term reservation, Nitish’s proposals to increase the quota for OBC, SCs, STs based on the state’s latest caste survey has silenced the BJP leaders who feel that any opposition to the quota would be politically inappropriate for the saffron party. So, Nitish has used the Mandal politics to counter the “Kamandal” politics of BJP. Though Muslims feel sidelined in Nitish Kumar’s scheme of things about reservation, analysts say it is a clever political move to defeat BJP at the hustings.
Sami Ahmad
PATNA—As the most important outcome of Bihar Caste Survey Report 2023, the state government has decided to increase the combined reservation quota in government jobs for the Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), Backward Class (BC) and Extremely Backward Class (EBC) groups by 15 percent. This would be now 65% from the previous 50%. If a 10% reservation of Economically Weaker Section (EWS) is added to that the total reservation in the state would be 75%. Unlike Telangana and Karnataka, there is no quota for Muslims, not even backwards Muslims, in Bihar.
The proposal for the increase in the quota of reservations was passed by the state cabinet. The state legislature is slated to pass the bill to increase reservations on November 9. The main opposition party – BJP – was very reluctant to the Bihar Caste Survey, though it agreed to it while in the government. Though the BJP is alleging anomalies in the Survey, it is claiming the credit for the Survey.
Every political party including the opposition Bhartiya Janata Party seems to be happy with the proposal to increase the reservation limit. Though the earlier released Bihar Caste Survey estimated the population of Muslims to be 17.7 percent, no data was released on their economic and educational status. There is no data on Muslim representation in government jobs also.
Member of Legislative Council Ghulam Ghaus of the ruling partner Janta Dal (United) has welcomed the decision to increase the reservation level up to 75% but he has demanded that a separate quota for OBC and EBC Muslims be fixed within the OBC and EBC quota to ensure proper representation for Muslims in the state governance.
Political observers believe that since opposing reservation is not possible for any party in the state, BJP has welcomed the decision of raising the total percentage of reservation. BJP is happy that there is no separate quota given to Muslims by the Nitish government because BJP’s entire politics is centred around opposition to Muslims. Had the Nitish government set aside a separate quota for Muslims, it would have provided a political fodder to BJP not only at the state level but at national level.
According to the Caste Survey, poverty among Muslim EBC like Bakkho is more than 44 percent, meaning 44% of Bakkhos don’t earn more than Rs. 6000 per month. This figure for Dafali community is 35 percent. Twenty nine percent Rangrez are poor.
According to the state government proposals, the reservation quota in the government jobs for EBC has been raised to 25 percent from the current 18 percent. For the BC, it is proposed to be 18 percent from the current 12 percent. For the SC the community, the proposed reservation quota is 20 percent from the current 16 percent while it is proposed to raise to two percent from the current one percent for the ST. The quota for EWS (Economically Backward Section) remains the same at 10 percent as per Supreme Court directions.
With the new proposal of an increase in reservations, Nitish Kumar has succeeded in thwarting the claim of the central home minister Amit Shah who alleged that the population of Yadavas and Muslims have been falsely increased by the government. That issue seems to have gone to the sidelines as the deputy chief minister has countered that claim by stating that if Nitish Kumar so wished, he could have increased the population of his caste- Kurmi.
BJP’s welcome of increasing the reservation percentage from 50 to 65 per cent the state BJP by the Nitish government is interpreted by analysts as BJP’s compromise policy. It is not politically wise for the BJP to oppose any such proposal while its parent organisation – RSS- is alleged to be an opponent of long-term reservation. While the backward caste BJP leaders are openly supporting the increased reservations, the upper caste BJP leaders are uncomfortably silent on that. There is no immediate reaction from the BJP’s upper caste supporters over their stand on the proposed increase in reservation percentage.
The decision to increase the reservations is considered to be a political masterstroke of Nitish Kumar as it is expected to counter the BJP’s Hindutva politics. The BJP is eying on all the 40 parliamentary seats in 2024 for the NDA, while it had won 39 seats in 2019. In 2019, Nitish Kumar’s Janta Dal (United) was with the BJP in the NDA.
