Nitish Kumar must be feeling a little miffed.
With his very dramatic break-up with the BJP after the ascent of Narendra Modi he was clearly taking a calculated risk – positioning himself as the NaMo alternative on the national scene. He felt that he could project himself as the Third Front Modi. An efficient can-do governance, but without the baggage of 2002.
The strategy was clear. If Modi wanted to sell himself as the development chief minister, Nitish Kumar could do the same. Even better while Modi's critics scoffed saying he had inherited a state with a robust economy, Kumar could claim credit for cleaning up a state like Bihar – a veritable Augean stable of fodder scams.
When he refused to form a government in 2005 because he did not have a clear majority he burnished his credentials as a man of integrity and principles. He seized the mansion of an IAS officer accused of major corruption adding to his anti-corruption allure. The electrical engineer turned politician was the original Mr. Clean.
PTI
The media was transfixed. In 2011 India Today dubbed him Bihar's Transformer.
No one could have imagined that in our lifetime a chief minister of Bihar, the state that lent the first letter of the acronym 'BIMARU' used to describe India's basket cases, would preside over the most dramatic turnaround in the country's contemporary history - and rid the expression 'Bihari' of its pejorative connotations.
The Economist gushed in 2010 that he had "uprooted the Jungle raj, restoring law and order." The economy grew 13 percent in 2011 and change was out there for all to see wrote the Economist.
The economic pickup is visible in the state capital, Patna, where people no longer fear to drive nice cars on the new flyover, or further afield. In the village of Tetri, which hosts the thatched huts of refugees from floods in 2008, ten mobile-phone companies compete for custom, offering calls at onepaisa ($0.0002) per second.
Then AAP and Arvind Kejriwal came along to steal his thunder. The media, always fickle, suddenly started to spin fantasies about PM Kejriwal ignoring the fact that the man actually has no track record of governance yet. But in our short attention span media, a new broom always sweeps cleaner.
No wonder when Kejriwal started his janta durbar, Nitish Kumar grumbled he'd been there and done that.
"There was no past example of such a programme when a chief minister interacted directly with the common man. It was started in Bihar during my regime," said Kumar.
At the time of his famous walk-out from the NDA, Kumar had sold it as a matter of principle rather than ambition. "We cannot compromise on our basic principles. We are not worried about the consequences," Kumar said loftily.
But the consequences are now evident in his own backyard writes Amitabh Srivastava in India Today. As India Today put it rather colourfully, leading a minority government "Nitish Kumar looks away as his defiant ministers run riot."
Shyam Rajak, the minister for Food and Consumer Protection is accused of trying to intimidate Ratna Purkayastha, the officiating assistant director of Patna Doordarshan. But Rajak has a big support base among the Mahadalit community. So no action was taken against him. Agriculture minister Narendra Singh was caught napping on the dais while Kumar presented his report card as chief minister. Singh criticized Kumar as well for relying on bureaucrats but again Kumar took no action. Singh's sons are MLAs as well.
India Today lists other ministers who have also embarrassed the party and defied its directives. At one time their actions would have brought about swift retribution. Kumar's iron hand would have come down fast and come down hard.
"There was a time when Nitish had no tolerance for underperforming or politically incorrect ministers, MPs and MLAs," writes Srivastava. In his years as CM, Kumar has removed more than a dozen ministers for various sins of omission and commission. Ramanand Prasad Singh, his transport minister got the boot after an old corruption case resurfaced. In 2010, excise minister Jamshed Ashraf was sacked for leaking confidential documents to the media.
Now, writes Srivastava "(t)he iron hand with which Nitish ruled Bihar before his split with the BJP seems to have gone limp."
Kumar still wants to claim a personal record of probity. His declaration of assets shows him to be poorer than 17 of his ministers and even his own son reports the New Indian Express. Even Arvind Kejriwal is richer than Nitish Kumar with assets over Rs 2 crore. Kumar declared Rs.17,909 cash in hand, and moveable assets worth Rs. 6.88 lakh. His immovable property has remained stuck at Rs 40 lakh since 2011.
But his own affidavit will only go so far. Kumar who had cozied up to the Congress once he had walked out of the NDA is now having to rethink his options. Arch rival Lalu Prasad is out on bail. The Congress has been thrashed in four states in the December elections. "(T)he JD(U) will be the only non-Congress and non-BJP alternative in Bihar," said Kumar recently.
Meanwhile there have already been wrinkles to the Nitish Kumar miracle-worker story.
Al Jazeera reported on how despite his own reputation for personal probity, Kumar could not do without politician-gangsters like Anant Singh who lord it over Bihar politics. Open magazine revealed how Kumar used his government's ad budget to control and bend the media to his will. Press Council chairman Markandey Katju said "The information I have gathered about the media in Bihar is not good… the press does not enjoy freedom at present… I have been told that people don't muster the courage to write against the Bihar government or its officials."
But that actually adds a bit to Nitish Kumar's strong man appeal which is not unappealing to voters. Unfortunately for Kumar, these latest stories about ministers running riot in what India Today called "the rogue durbar" of Nitish Kumar, end up showing him as someone unable or unwilling to control his flock.
And a Mr Clean who built a reputation as the man with no tolerance for corruption and indiscipline, can ill afford to become just another politician turning a blind eye to ministers running amuck even if he has a reputation for personal probity. That sounds a bit like another head of state on his way out in New Delhi and who would want to be compared to him these days.
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