Jharkhand: JMM-Congress alliance ends

The JMM has announced it will contest on its own, opening up the possibility of post-poll bargaining with others. “Everyone knows [Congress’s Pradeep] Balmuchu-ji, [Alamgir] Alam saheb and Furkan [Ansari] saheb are responsible for this along with Girinath-ji [Singh, state president of RJD],” said JMM general secretary Surpiyo Bhattacharya. Outgoing chief minister Hemant Soren had been camping in Delhi since Tuesday to thrash out a seat-sharing formula. “The Congress is in a mood to give the BJP a walkover here,” said JMM secretary Vinod Pandey, implying the BJP – already in a position of strength here – is set to gain from the Congress’s decision.

Sources in the Congress as well as JMM said the straw that broke the camel’s back was the dispute over four assembly seats, three of them in the Santhal Pargana region. While Pradeep Balmuchu, a Rajya Sabha member who was the former Pradesh Congress President, wants his daughter from Ghatshila. Alamgir Alam wants Pakur, while Furkan Ansari wants to contest from Madhupur while ensuring his son contested from Jamtara.

All four seats that the Congress insisted on is being held by the JMM. RJD’s Singh wants to contest from Garhwa, where he came second the last time. The paranoia about the future of the alliance eventually got to JMM’s Mithilesh Thakur – who had come third last time when the Congress and JMM fought separately – who hurried to submit his nomination papers even before his party formally nominated him so that he would be ahead of Singh. This also meant Thakur was the first to submit nomination papers in the state.

“Some of our senior leaders were at risk of losing their seats. We had to save the party as well as the honour of our senior leaders,” said B.K. Hariprasad, the Congress General Secretary and in-charge of the state, not hiding his disappointment. Hariprasad had drawn the ire of the Pradesh Congress’s extended Working Committee on October 27 for his October 15 announcement that his party would be part of an alliance led by Hemant Soren.

Sources in both parties say their leaders had broadly agreed to the number of seats each would contest from: JMM had offered 40 seats to the Congress on the understanding that the latter would allocate seats to the RJD and JD (U) from its quota. In the Lok Sabha elections, the JMM had allocated 10 of Jharkhand’s 14 seats to the Congress, one of which it passed on to the RJD. While the Congress as well as RJD did not win any seats, JMM won two of the four it contested.

The victorious camp of the Congress did not hide its glee, with former Ranchi MP Subodh Kant Sahay going so far as to shut the door on Babulal Marandi. “No other party will be party of our alliance,” he said in Delhi. At the same time, JVM (P) General Secretary Pradeep Sinha returned from Delhi after holding exploratory talks. “We listed before them the constituencies in which we have a chance of winning. It is now up to the Congress to take a decision,” he said.

This is not the first time the Congress had held talked to Babulal Marandi. A leader who was involved in the first round of negotiations – which took place before Hariprasad’s October 15 announcement – claimed the Congress leadership had offered him the chance to become the party’s leader in Jharkhand. “Babulalji could not decide. The BJP was also wooing him. Eventually, he came to the conclusion he would go best if he went alone,” said the leader.