Tejashwi Yadav
In politics, opposition parties usually make trips in election years. These yatras create an atmosphere of change among the people to defeat the ruling party in the elections, but just 15 months before the assembly elections in Bihar, Rashtriya Janata Dal’s CM contender Tejashwi Yadav has embarked on a yatra. That too when only 5 months ago, Tejashwi had visited the entire Bihar through Yatra. However, this time the name and venue of the Yatra has changed.
Amidst Tejashwi’s gratitude journey from Samastipur, the political circles of Bihar are asking why the new successor of RJD is in such a hurry about the journey?
Tejashwi will visit 4 districts in the 8-day journey
Gratitude Yatra which started from today i.e. September 10 will continue till September 17. Tejaswi has started his journey from Samastipur, the land of former CM Karpuri Thakur. Tejashwi will stay in Samastipur for 2 days. After this he will go to Darbhanga and Madhubani.
The last stop of the tour is Muzaffarpur. This will complete the first leg of the journey. It is being said that Tejashwi will have one-to-one interaction with the workers during these visits.
Why did Tejashwi Yadav go on tour?
Rashtriya Janata Dal has named Tejashwi Yadav’s Yatra as Abhar Yatra. The party says that through this yatra, Tejaswi will express his gratitude for people’s support on issues like reservation, caste-based census. According to the RJD, during the yatra, Tejashwi will also meet his workers in each assembly, hence it is also named the Worker Dialogue Yatra.
However, it is being said that apart from these reasons, there are 3 main reasons behind Tejashwi Yadav’s visit –
1. Pacific Adolescent Factor- Bihar election strategist Prashant Kishor is in the news these days. PK, who has been roaming in Bihar for almost 2 years, will launch his new party Jansuraj on October 2. PK has been attacking Tejashwi Yadav for the past several months and trying to make a dent in his core electorate.
In recent days, there were reports of RJD workers migrating to Jansuraj from several districts. State President Jagdanand Singh also issued a letter regarding the defection in the party. In his letter, Singh appealed to the activists to politicize ideology.
However, ground level migration continues in RJD. It is being said that this migration may increase as the elections approach. Tejashwi has embarked on a journey to stop this. As per the scheduled programme, Tejashwi will meet assembly wise workers in all the districts.
2. Functioning of Lok Sabha- Tejashwi Yadav is starting his journey from Samastipur. After this they will go to Madhubani, Darbhanga and Muzaffarpur. These districts have a total of 6 Lok Sabha seats and Tejashwi’s party lost badly in the recent Lok Sabha elections. Interestingly, RJD and its allies have not been able to win these 6 seats for more than 15 years.
This time, RJD was expected to win in these areas, but due to infighting, the party could not win a single seat. These districts have around 50 assembly seats and last time NDA got a big lead here.
Out of these 50 seats, RJD got only 10 seats. In 2020, the NDA won 126 seats and the Grand Alliance won around 115 seats in Bihar. 122 is the magic number to form a government in a 243-seat assembly. If RJD had managed to perform well in these areas, it would have formed the government in 2020 itself.
3. Issue of caste survey and reservation- Ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in Bihar, the caste-based survey and the issue of reservation resonated. Nitish and Tejashwi’s governments did this together, but Nitish Kumar defected to the BJP before the elections. Due to which Tejashwi Yadav could not take advantage of it.
Patna High Court has stayed the reservation after the Lok Sabha elections and currently the issue is before the Supreme Court. RJD is also a party in this matter. Tejaswi wants to bring the issue back to the political center through the Yatra, so that his party can take credit for it.
Dalit, OBC and minority communities constitute about 85 percent of Bihar’s population.
