What clicked for JMM in Jharkhand?

Among these beneficiaries, women constitute a cohesive and organised sub-group, possibly given their resilience in the face of hardships in the everyday life of households. So, social welfare policies such as Ladli Behna Yojana in Madhya Pradesh, Mukhyamantri Majhi Ladki Bahin Yojana in Maharashtra, and Maiya Samman Yojana in Jharkhand, which provide monthly financial support to women, have paid rich dividends and mobilised women beneficiaries in favour of political parties that conceptualised, launched and implemented these.

A factor behind the victory of the INDIA bloc in Jharkhand is undoubtedly the impact of this and the other popular social support schemes launched and implemented by the Hemant Soren government. Policies such as Savitribai Phule Kishori Samriddhi Yojana for young girls, Abua Awas Yojana, Birsa Harit Gram Yojana evolved a class of beneficiaries who likely voted for the JMM and its alliance partners in these elections. Democratic electoral politics is also about economics. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Viksit Bharat vision places significant importance on such schemes helping empower the poor who then evolve into a homogeneous beneficiary “caste”. This beneficiary “caste” will then tend to favour the political parties that disseminate benefits to the needy.

Hemant Soren and the JMM also cultivated sympathy over the former’s imprisonment, projecting him as a victim of retributive politics. Slogans such as “jail ke badle vote” (vote as the answer to jailing leaders) worked well in favour of the JMM and the INDIA grouping. Soren’s wife Kalpana Soren’s campaign in tribal areas strengthened the narrative of victimisation.

Tribal communities constitute around 28% of the state’s population. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) tried hard to mobilise tribal voters through a narrative of pro-tribal governance policies and a focus on upholding and celebrating “tribal pride”. The party and its allies do have many tribal faces but, Hemant Soren retained the edge when it came to the trust of tribal communities — tribals have consistently remained the base vote for the JMM in certain parts of Jharkhand since a long time.

Tribal identity politics remains strong in obvious and not-so-obvious ways. The poll results show that the JMM has a stronger connect with this identity, as asserted by the tribal communities in the state. The party’s emphasis on the implementation of a Sarna (a dominant tribal belief system in the state) Code intensified the identity assertion of many tribal communities. The BJP tried to stoke fears of “outsider” intrusion (through not-so-subtle claims of Bangladeshis and Rohingyas being allowed to settle in the state). The narrative failed to penetrate the tribal zones in the state.

Another big factor in the polls was the INDIA bloc’s projection of a single chief ministerial face (Hemant Soren) versus the poorly veiled factionalism within the BJP (with widely discussed contenders being Arjun Munda, Babulal Marandi, Raghubar Das, and even Champai Soren, who joined the BJP from the JMM after a short stint as chief minister). The confusion over the leadership question in the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) cost it dearly.

The JMM/INDIA grouping’s victory is the outcome of several strong factors, as discussed here (a strong victimisation narrative, social welfare schemes, and the politics of tribal selfhood). The last, of course, was potent to the extent it defeated the BJP’s competing narrative of tribal pride. And, as far as spinning welfare schemes as vote magnets is concerned, while the BJP has repeatedly played a strong hand by parading the reach and superior implementation of such schemes designed by the Centre, it was the local schemes that mattered more in this election when it came to establishing beneficiary connect and seeking votes. Therein lies the message for the political class and democracy at large.

Badri Narayan is director, GB Pant Social Science Institute. The views expressed are personal

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