Blow for good governance in Bihar

The recent decision of a lower court in Patna to sentence JD(U) leader Anand Mohan Singh and his wife Lovely Anand for the murder of a district magistrate in 1994 is a welcome surprise. Not least because such courageous display of institutional independence is a rare exception in Bihar.

The sentencing of Anand Mohan — given that it comes close on the heels of across-the-spectrum convictions, prison terms and long periods of custody for such notorious gangster-turned-politicos as Munna Shukla (LJP), Mohammed Shahabuddin (RJD), and Pappu Yadav (ex-RJD) — also proves that partisan loyalties are of little consequence now, vis-a-vis Bihar’s institutional functioning. For a state infamous for its degenerate public culture of patronage politics and routine interference at all levels of governance, that is surely a commendable development.

The Nitish Kumar government must be hailed before all else for having transformed Bihar’s political climate so as to enable and encourage such institutional autonomy and fearlessness. Unfortunately, George Fernandes does not seems to share Nitish Kumar’s penchant for non-partisan governance.

He has, in order to outmanoeuvre the Bihar CM in the long-drawn power struggle within the JD(U), come out in support of Anand Mohan. That Fernandes should be indulging in such low-level politics is hardly surprising, though. What is actually more disturbing is that there exists a constituency in Bihar for his arrant nonsense.

The 2005 anti-Lalu verdict in the state was, contrary to popular opinion, not purely a clamour for good governance. The consensus that supports the current dispensation is driven quite a bit by misplaced aspirations of upper castes (mainly Thakurs and Bhumihars) and non-Yadav OBCs to reclaim the traditional privileges they lost to the ascendant Muslim-Yadav elite during Lalu’s (and wife Rabri’s) 15-year-long stint in the state.

The CM’s insistence on interpreting his mandate as one for good governance would succeed in real terms only if he recognises that Bihar’s society is still as fragmented and stratified as before, and then works towards forging a cohesive will for inclusive governance. Only that would prevent his regime, and its slogan of good governance, from being hijacked by retrograde social interests.