The problem

ELECTION studies in India have, in the main, been the preserve and forte of psephologists and political scientists who usually restrict themselves to predictions and analysis of outcomes, study of voting behaviour, implications for government formation, party system, nature and character of the leadership – in other words, the formal domain of politics. In recent years, however, one senses a perceptible eagerness among sociologists and anthropologists to turn their attention to the electoral process in an effort to examine the processes of social mobilization, demand articulation and social transformation. The attempt is to move beyond the drama and magnificence of elections to get a better grasp of the prevailing social structure and the emerging shifts and changes that the electoral campaigns/contests and their outcomes may suggest. In a classical sense, the mission is to figure out the prevailing inequities of power, and unravel the mechanisms through which it is exercised, as well as discern the potential for resistance. In this framework, the forms and patterns of participation, as well as non-participation, constitute critical elements of analysis.

The Bihar assembly elections of 2015 offer a unique opportunity to make sense of the underlying social and political churning in a deeply stratified society. In what is primarily a rural economy, land remains the critical determinant of power configurations; unfortunately it remains grossly under-researched. In post-independence Bihar, the anti-zamindari sentiments aroused by the Kisan Sabha-led peasant movement in the 1930s, forced an otherwise reluctant state to initiate reforms in the agrarian structure. However, deliberate obfuscation and inordinate delays in the promulgation and implementation of the land reform act defeated its very purpose, thereby enabling the persistence and survival of a semi-feudal structure. The piecemeal social changes that zamindari abolition in Bihar produced, at best impacted the interstitial strata of agrarian caste-class structure. The abolition of large estates helped propel sections of certain agrarian castes, such as the better-off segments of the Yadavs and Kurmis, into the ranks of the middle and rich peasantry. It also precipitated the rise of a politics centred around demands for representation and social justice, which successfully attracted the lowest castes, the quintessential fieldworkers.

In subsequent years, new political alliances gave birth to fresh categorizations, wherein relatively affluent dalits were demarcated from the poorest ones, thus paving the way for the emergence of a new social and political identity, the mahadalits. Earlier, a similar exercise of sub-categorization had led to the emergence of another new identity – the extremely backward castes – distinct from the backward castes. A more or less identical process can also be traced among the Muslims of Bihar, with the emergence of the Pasmanda and Dalit Muslim movements. The skewed employment pattern and distorted land relations, mirroring the social divides, is evident from the NSSO (2009-10) figures – while as many as 47% of the SC/ST, and 21% of the OBC are poor and landless, only 11% of the upper caste households have no land and survive solely on selling their labour. A mirror opposite: unlike nearly 40% of the upper castes and 12% of the OBC, a mere 4% of SC/ST households own more than one hectare of agricultural land.

Neo-liberal aspirations have of late come to determine the course of policies and politics in two seemingly paradoxical ways. At one level, a new middle class supposedly seeks to transcend the ‘primordiality’ of caste based mobilization and embrace the apparently neutral and larger solidarity of ‘nation’ – paradoxically thereby leaning towards majoritarianism. Simultaneously, development, presented as an identity-blind and universal model of material progress, acquires a certain centrality in political discourse. In an agrarian economy such as that of Bihar, how do the different aspirations for development and imaginations of nation play out in the processes of social mobilization? How have different social groups, as well as political formations, claiming to represent diverse interests, responded to such constructions? Is Bihar preparing to offer an alternative to market driven development thinking and to the majoritarian perils of nationalism? In this context, how do we assess an emerging Bihari self-pride, symbolized in the popular Bhojpuri film, ‘Ek Bihari, sab par Bihari’ or in the election slogan, Bihari versus Bahri (outsider)? Is this truly a reflection of subaltern consciousness, the classical rise of the periphery against the metropolis? This seems unlikely as the new middle class, one at the forefront of the new-fangled assertiveness, is concentrated in the metropolis where the triumphalist narratives of the market and the nation were first authored.

The different contributors have approached the problem from various disciplinary locations – politics, history, political economy, journalism and sociology and accordingly apply both an empirical and a long duree lens. Raw electoral data is subjected to rigorous analysis to explain voting behaviour and political choice of different social groups and classes. Equally, sociological enquiry relying primarily on historical data and narratives looks at patterns of migration, processes of social transformation and their influence on political decisions. The prevailing agrarian structure, its linkages with the emerging market economy, the rise of a ‘nouveau elite’ and the state’s adoption of developmentalism is studied from a political economy perspective, even as journalists and anthropologists freeze the campaign through images, speeches and slogans. This issue of Seminar attempts to make sense of what made Bihar 2015 elections unique, without losing sight of its embeddedness within the social and political history of the state.

TANWEER FAZAL

 

* Some of the essays in this symposium were initially presented at a national seminar on Bihar 2015 elections organized by the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi.