Kochadhaman

What AIMIM Needs to Know to Repeat Its Bihar Success in West Bengal

AIMIM has already announced that it will field candidates in Malda, Murshidabad, Uttar Dinajpur and Dakshin Dinajpur districts of West Bengal in the upcoming assembly elections in 2021.

Almost a year ago Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) won the first seat in the so-called Hindi belt by winning the Kishanganj by-election in Bihar. I remember that the arrival of Owaisi in the Seemanchal region of Bihar had generated huge interest among the locals of Chakulia, Kishanganj’s nearest assembly constituency that falls in West Bengal.

Kishanganj is the nearest city for this part of Bengal and thus very important for the local political economy. In tea stalls and sweet shops, people enthusiastically discussed if AIMIM leaders would cross the state border to try their luck in Uttar Dinajpur, a Bengal district with 48% Muslim population.

Since the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Owaisi found huge popularity among a section of Muslims who widely shared his fierce Urdu speeches, given in the parliament and elsewhere, attacking Hindutva of the BJP and soft-Hindutva of the Congress. During the by-election campaign, his passionate speech against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Kishanganj resonated with many in the region which shares an international border with Bangladesh.

Last year I attended an anti-CAA rally at Chakulia on November 16, 2019, jointly organised by local Left Front MLA Ali Imran Ramz (Victor) and Kolkata-based economist Prasenjit Bose’s Joint Forum Against NRC. While former JNU Students Union leader Kanhaiya Kumar was speaking on the dais, a local Muslim youth sitting next to me commented, “I heard Owaisi sahab at Kishanganj. Kanhaiya is great but no one can speak on the problems of Muslim quam like him.”

Also read: Bihar: What Worked in AIMIM’s Favour in Five Assembly Seats of Seemanchal?

Kishanganj, with its sizeable Muslim population, had seen the appearance of outspoken Muslim leaders from outside even earlier. Former Indian diplomat Syed Sahabuddin and president of All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat (a motley group of Muslim organisations) contested and won this seat in 1985 Lok Sabha elections on a Janata Dal ticket. He lost his place to former Union minister M.J. Akbar in the 1989 elections, only to snatch it back in 1991, which he celebrated with a helicopter ride to Kishanganj from Patna.

The issue of language

After AIMIM’s remarkable success in Kishanganj district in the recently-held Bihar election, where they won four of the six assembly seats, they have earned not only national fame but also certain confidence that has led Owaisi to declare that his party would fight next year Bengal assembly polls.

He particularly mentioned four districts of West Bengal with high Muslim population as his target: Malda, Murshidabad, Uttar and Dakshin Dinajpur. Among all of them, Uttar Dinajpur is not only closest to Kishanganj and Araria, where AIMIM’s gains are concentrated but also it shares a peculiar history and demography with Seemanchal region.

AIMIM’s Asaduddin Owaisi at a rally in Bihar’s Kishanganj. Photo: Asaduddinowaisi/Facebook

The issue of language in Uttar Dinajpur is vital to AIMIM’s prospects. Muslims are mainly divided between Surjapuri and Shershahbadia community just like in Kishanganj. Though Surjapuri people speak in Surjapuri dialect (also known as deshi bhasha), many among them see Urdu as their language and associate it with class mobility. Shershahbadia community, whom local Surjapuris view as outsiders from Malda and Murshidabad district, speak in badia dialect and learn Bengali in schools.

Also read: After Bihar Debut, Asaduddin Owaisi and AIMIM Eye Further Expansion

For Owaisi, his popularity on account of his impressive Urdu speeches could act as his strength here unlike in other parts of Bengal. Before coming to Bihar, he expanded his base in the Urdu speaking parts of Maharashtra where Deccan identity played a significant role in rewarding him with few MLAs and one MP.

In West Bengal, Urdu speakers are mainly spread in parts of Kolkata, Asansol subdivision in Burdwan and Islampur subdivision of Uttar Dinajpur. As per the West Bengal Official Language (Amendment) Act, 2012, in Islampur subdivision, in which Chakulia, Chopra, Islampur, Goalpokher, Karandighi assembly constituencies fall, Urdu has been given official status because a section of local Muslim population campaigned for it.

The appointment of an Urdu teacher in Daribhit High School near Islampur caused massive unrest among the local Bengali speaking refugee population in September 2018 and led to police firing resulting in two dead and three injured. Calling deceased local youths as language martyrs, and to counter its Hindi belt party tag, West Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh this year declared September 20 as the West Bengal Mother Language Day.

The complex history of Uttar Dinajpur and Kishanganj

When partition happened in 1947, Radcliffe Line divided this region in a way that territorial link between North Bengal and South Bengal was snapped with erstwhile Purnea district sandwiched between both of them. Later State Reorganisation Commission approved the remapping of state boundaries in a way where parts of Kishanganj and Katihar subdivision was added to former West Dinajpur district to restore the link. Later West Dinajpur was further divided in 1992 into North and Dakshin Dinajpur.

This part of India has always flirted with many political experiments in the past. On the account of partition in 1946, Dinajpur and parts of Purnea were the epicentres of historic Tebhaga movement to demand two-third of the produce for sharecroppers. At that time local Muslim farmers formed the backbone of Kishan Sabha, the peasant front of the Communist Party of India. The history of peasant revolution did not end just there. In late 1960s northern part of West Dinajpur had become the heart of Naxalbari movement. The armed uprising was crushed by the then West Bengal government, but nonetheless, communist parties established their stronghold in this region. The local hero of Tebhaga movement, a poor Muslim labourer called Bacha Munshi whom Jyoti Basu respectfully called ‘Bachada’, later fought assembly elections on a Communist Party of India(Marxist) ticket and became MLA from Chopra constituency.

The most senior politician of this region is a septuagenarian figure Abdul Karim Chowdhury. He has been a record 10 times MLA and a former West Bengal minister in the Mamata Banerjee government. He is an old Congressman who has won both Chopra and Islampur constituencies since the early 1970s, after being sidelined by former Raiganj MP and senior minister at the Centre, Priyaranjan Dasmunshi, joined TMC. After winning in 2001 assembly elections from Islampur constituency, he became the first TMC MLA from north Bengal.

TMC MLA Abdul Karim Chowdhary. Photo: Facebook

He holds the seat even today, however, local newspapers are regularly publishing news on his rift with TMC district president Kanhaiyalal Agarwal, a local Marwari businessman. Agarwal, who is a former Congress MLA from the same Islampur seat, joined TMC to contest Lok Sabha elections from Raiganj in 2019 but lost to BJP’s Debasree Chowdhury, who is currently serving as Union minister of state for women and child development in the Modi government.

Also read: Lessons From the Bihar Results on the Electoral Politics in West Bengal

Congress leader Dasmunshi and his wife Deepa Dasmunshi mentored several Muslim youths in this region during their time as MPs who went on to become MLAs in several constituencies of Uttar Dinajpur. However, most of them later joined TMC as Congress lost its influence in the region with 2014 Lok Sabha debacle and Mamata Banerjee actively wooed them to expand her party in the district. Prominent among them is Hamidul Rahman and Golam Rabbani who are now the sitting MLAs from Chopra and Goalpokher respectively. The latter is also the minister of state of labour in the current Mamata government.

Apart from political patronage, family links have remained an important factor that dominated the local politics in several constituencies. So, in the case of Golam Rabbani, his father was an old Congressman and elected panchayat official. In Chakulia (before delimitation part of Goalpokher) constituency, Ramzan Ali was a local strongman from All India Forward Bloc (AIFB), a Left front ally, who had won the seat from 1977 to 1991. After he was killed in 1994 in MLA hostel in Kolkata by his wife Talat Sultana, AIFB gave the ticket to Ramzan Ali’s brother Hafiz Alam Sairani who later on became relief minister in Buddhadeb Bhattacharya’s government. Sairani later lost the seat to Congress leader Deepa Dasmunshi in 2006 assembly election.

However, when Deepa Dasmunshi decided to contest Raiganj Lok Sabha poll after her husband fell ill, in 2009 by-election AIFB fielded Ali Imran Ramz who won the seat. He is still the MLA from Chakulia and a strong Left contender for the upcoming elections. Recently there was news that Prashant Kishor team apparently tried to poach him for TMC, but members of that team denied such news and alleged Ali Imran Ramz himself approached them.

In Karandighi, a constituency with 53% Muslim population, has not had a Muslim MLA since Haji Sajjad Hussain who won the seat from 1971 to 1991. His brother Sheikh Sharafat Hussain was the MLA of Goalpokher in 1971–77. Both were Congressmen and enjoyed considerable support from local Rajbongshi population who form an important voting bloc. In recent years, be it AIFB, Congress or TMC, all preferred Rajbongshi candidate in this seat. Currently, Manodeb Sinha of TMC is the MLA in this constituency.

Who will be the Akhtarul Iman of Uttar Dinajpur?

Most political analysts agree that the key figure in the rise of AIMIM in Seemanchal is Akhtarul Iman. He won from the Amour constituency (next to Karandighi) with a huge margin in the latest Bihar assembly polls. Before joining AIMIM in 2015, he had already earned considerable political experience as Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MLA from Kochadhaman and 2014 Lok Sabha candidate from Janta Dal (United).

Bihar AIMIM chief Akhtarul Iman. Photo: Facebook/Akhtarul Iman Fans ID.

The morning after the Bihar election results, I was sitting at a tea stall in Chakulia where a local Muslim cleric who runs a stationery shop made a valid point. He said, “It is just not enough to be famous to win elections. Akhtarul Iman Sahab organised at the grassroots for years to gift Owaisi Sahab with all these seats.”

To break the entrenched politics of patronage and family lineage, AIMIM needs to find its Akhtarul Iman of Uttar Dinajpur to convert the fame and curiosity of people regarding Barrister Asaduddin Owaisi into votes to enter Bengal state assembly from this region.

Dr. Adil Hossain is a freelance journalist based in Uttar Dinajpur, West Bengal, and holds a DPhil in International Development from the University of Oxford.

Nobody’s ‘B Team’: The Politics of Owaisi’s AIMIM

As ‘secular parties’ dial up the attack on Owaisi and the AIMIM, a look at the factors that led to the party’s success in the Bihar elections.

Some time ago, most news pundits and Delhi analysts thought that Bihar elections would be a cakewalk for the NDA. However, a sudden wave of support for Nitish Kumar’s young and energetic rival Tejashwi Yadav changed the scenario. This was supported by most exit polls.

A section of the same analysts hurriedly predicted that the underdog grand alliance might clean sweep the polls. Again, things did not precipitate as predicted. The NDA narrowly defeated the grand alliance late in the night of the results day.

A significant highlight of the match was the electoral performance of Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM). This was Owaisi’s second assembly election in Bihar. His party won five out of the 20 seats on which it contested.

He is now being accused of aiding the BJP. A video of Rajdeep Sardesai interviewing Owaisi went viral on Twitter. Sardesai questioned Owaisi on “eating into the secular votes”. During the same debate show, Pawan Khera of the Congress alleged that Owaisi is riding on a wave of “reverse-radicalisation” of minorities. Swaraj Party’s Yogendra Yadav expressed deep worry about AIMIM attracting Muslim support. At a press conference, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhary alerted the “secular parties” of his “vote cutter” tactics. Owaisi hit back and said that he is rekindling the hope of minorities in a shrinking democracy.

What AIMIM’s performance says

While there is a massive uproar about Owaisi dividing the Muslim vote and helping the NDA, all these allegations fall flat when we analyse the data. Of the 20 seats that AIMIM contested, NDA was successful in six seats. Only on one of these seats, the votes polled in favour of AIMIM were more than the victory margin for NDA candidates. Raniganj is the only seat where AIMIM got more votes than the victory margin between the NDA and mahagathbandhan candidates. There, AIMIM candidate Roshan Devi got 2,412 votes, 108 votes more than the winning margin (2,304) of the JD(U) over RJD.

In the campaign trail, Congress’ rash attack to discredit AIMIM only seemed to increase his popularity in Seemanchal. In Rahul Gandhi’s presence, Abdul Jaleel Mastan, a Congress MLA, said that he would break the “outsider” Owaisi’s limbs and send him back to Hyderabad. Mastan, a six-time MLA from Amour, received 31,863 votes and stood distant third, and former BJP MLA Saba Zafar, contesting this time from JDU, stood second. AIMIM’s Akhtarul Imam won this seat by a considerable margin.

AIMIM was in direct contest with the NDA in four out of five seats it won. Jokihat was the only seat where it directly challenged RJD. Its candidate Shahnawaz defeated his own brother Sarfaraz (RJD) with 7383 votes. AIMIM also contested Sherghati seat, on which a RJD candidate who is an expelled BJP member became successful. Before this, she was an active member of the fringe Durga Vahini, the women’s wing of the VHP. In Aurangabad, another seat with sizeable Muslim population, Congress fielded a candidate accused of inciting communal passion during Ramanavami in 2018. So, how exactly “secular” votes for the grand alliance on such seats were affected?

Also read: The Albatross Around Asaduddin Owaisi’s Neck and Why He Should Disown It

We also need to look at the several strong Muslim candidates fielded by RJD, like Abdul Bari Siddiqui. He could not benefit from the widely talked Muslim-Yadav camaraderie of RJD while non-Muslim candidates reaped the benefit of the Muslim votes.

This is not the first time that the Congress has made such accusations. During the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, when AIMIM contested just one seat out of 40 in Bihar, it was accused of polarising “secular votes”. The lone seat of Kishanganj, where its state president Akhtarul Imam was the candidate, in a close contest finished third with 2,95,029 votes. Congress candidate Mohammad Jawed won that seat with 3,67,017 votes. The argument of Congress alleging Owaisi helping BJP stands null as it did not contest the other 39 seats in Bihar where that time Mahagathbandhan was unable to defeat BJP and allies.

CAA, a polling issue

During the current Bihar elections, the constant attack of the Congress on Owaisi was misplaced. It was posing to be an alternative to the incumbent NDA government in Bihar and not as the sole guardian of Muslim voters. Congressmen like Imran Pratapgarhi, who was not able to save his deposits from Moradabad in Lok Sabha elections, repeatedly attacked AIMIM. On the question of anti-CAA and NRC protests, he asked why Owaisi did not visit Shaheen Bagh. One may recall that Rahul Gandhi or Arvind Kejriwal did not visit Shaheen Bagh as well.

Meanwhile, Owaisi was the most vocal opponent of the new citizenship law in the Parliament. In fact, he even tore that bill in the house in defiance. Owaisi addressed several anti-CAA rallies and public meetings across India and specifically in Hyderabad. At the same time, leaders of “secular parties” like AAP and Congress preferred a more convenient “strategic silence”.

Also read: Ahead of Bihar Assembly Elections, Owaisi and Bhim Army Forge Dalit-Muslim Unity

In Delhi, Muslims strongly supported AAP to halt the overtly belligerent anti-Muslim rhetoric of the BJP. Despite AAP’s victory, Muslims suffered. In less than two weeks after the election results were announced, New Delhi witnessed the deadliest anti-Muslim riots since Partition. Many critics accused the AAP government of looking away while mobs were shooting and looting Muslim neighbourhoods in northeast Delhi. Some even accuse CM Kejriwal of toeing Amit Shah’s line. Aam Aadmi Party’s official stand on Shaheen Bagh now is that it was a BJP conspiracy.

Owaisi’s stance on CAA has not changed an inch. He has maintained that the law must be repealed and that all political prisoners be released. After the Delhi riots, he poignantly expressed the angst of all Indian Muslims in parliament. In Bihar, his vocal attacks on the anti-minority politics of the BJP forced the mahagathbandhan to break its silence on the CAA.

‘Development’, an unheard agenda in Seemanchal

Seemanchal, a Muslim-dominated area, always fall among the lowest in social development indices. Since Independence, it has mostly been represented by Congress, or in recent years by its allies like the RJD. Muslims in every election were given the responsibility to preserve secularism. They had to keep their developmental needs like school, roads, hospitals, and colleges aside by voting en masse for Congress and RJD. While they successfully rescued secularism, they never received any attention from the successive “secular” governments. The malaise was so bad that the “secular” parties did not even mention development during their campaigns. Muslims of Seemanchal were fed-up with the “BJP aa jayegi” blackmail.

Meanwhile, Owaisi focused his campaign on under-development. His “Seemanchal ko nyay” and promise of a better representation converted into votes, as did the anti-incumbency against representatives from mahagathbandhan. While development was a focal point in his speeches, he spoke in detail about CAA-NRC protests, rampant mob-violence, and the “unjust” Babri Masjid verdict. He frequently questioned the welcoming “soft-Hindutva” stand of Kamal Nath and Priyanka Gandhi on the Babri issue.

AIMIM’s Asaduddin Owaisi at a rally in Bihar’s Kishanganj. Photo: Asaduddinowaisi/Facebook

The avant-garde of minority rights in parliament

With the BJP giving an aggressive push to its Hindu nationalist agenda, “secular parties” have struggled to find a potent ideological response in the last six years. At times, they have chosen to strategically keep quiet when their voices were needed the most. Many have adopted their own version of “soft Hindutva”.

With Owaisi, be it chanting of particular national slogans or the issue of Babri demolition, unlike the Congress party, he has vehemently protested all these narrow litmus tests for national belonging. While the Congress supported the draconian UAPA in parliament, Owaisi warned that UAPA will be used indiscriminately against Muslims and political dissenters. In the past six years, many Muslims have faced violent attacks by extremist Hindu mobs on the pretext of ‘love jihad’, cow slaughter, forced chanting of Hindu slogans, and at times for merely appearing Muslim. “Secular parties” failed to stand by the Muslims. However, Owaisi has been consistent in calling out the government for its inability to prevent hate crimes against minorities and abetting them.

Also read: Bihar: What Worked in AIMIM’s Favour in Five Assembly Seats of Seemanchal?

Muslim voters are neither naïve nor radical. They want a sense of belonging too. “Secular parties” have failed to provide that. Owaisi’s passionate speeches and advocacy of minority rights had to sooner or later translate into votes. AIMIM’s exploits in Bihar mark the end of Congress’ monopoly over Muslim voters. This shall broaden the democratic agency of Muslims. They can now bargain more from these parties that have treated them like frightened cattle.

The use of terms like “vote cutter” or “B team” for a legitimate political party by another, is an insult not just to the democratic values but also to the independent agency of the voters. The constitutional right to contest in constituencies of choice is extended to all political parties, not just one.

Owaisi’s alliance with Upendra Kushwaha led RLSP, Mayawati’s BSP, and two other small parties demonstrates his intentions to expand his voter base to non-Muslims. Although AIMIM contested only on 20 seats, 5 out of its candidates were non-Muslims. Owaisi has cleared his intentions to contest in West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh elections. If the “secular parties” have learned anything from Bihar, they won’t simply discredit Owaisi. As a party which can get in alliance with Shiv Sena in Maharashtra in the name of “preserving democracy” cannot digest the rise of aspirational Muslims, this reeks of nothing but insecurity and misplaced anger as it marks an end to the politics of “hostage secularism”.

Neel Madhav and Alishan Jafri are independent journalists. Neel, based in Khagaria, Bihar and observes day to day politics closely while Alishan, based in New Delhi writes on communalism and minorities.

Bihar: What Worked in AIMIM’s Favour in Five Assembly Seats of Seemanchal?

The party forayed into Seemanchal politics in 2015 and could not open its account. It now has a respectable tally and the victories were secured with comfortable margins.

A week before assembly elections were announced in Bihar, I asked an elderly man in Kishanganj’s Bahadurganj who he thought was deserving of an All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) ticket there, given that there were many contenders. The man replied, “Why would I care, I only know Asaduddin Owaisi and Akhtarul Iman. I will vote for AIMIM, no matter who is the candidate.”

AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi and the party’s state president Akhtarul Iman had become personality cults in most areas under the Kishanganj Lok Sabha constituency well before the Bihar elections. There are six assembly constituencies under the Kishanganj parliamentary constituency, and the AIMIM won four of them – Amour, Baisi, Bahadurganj and Kochadhaman. The party lost the Kishanganj assembly segment, which it had won in the 2019 by-polls but it gained the Jokihat seat under the Araria Lok Sabha constituency, taking the party’s tally to five.

The AIMIM won all five seats comfortably. Akhtarul Iman won Amour by a margin of 52,515 votes, the second-highest margin of any candidate in this election. Similarly, Anzar Nayeemi won Bahadurganj by a margin of 45,215 votes, Izhar Asfi won Kochadhaman by 36,143 votes, Syed Ruknuddin Ahmed won Baisi by 16,373 votes and Shanawaz won Jokihat by 7,383 votes.

Also read: Ahead of Bihar Assembly Elections, Owaisi and Bhim Army Forge Dalit-Muslim Unity

A meteoric rise

When the AIMIM made its entry in Seemanchal during the 2015 Bihar elections, the party contested six seats. It could not win a single seat and stood second only in one. Four years later, when Iman contested from the Kishanganj Lok Sabha constituency in the 2019 general elections, the party took the lead in two assembly constituencies – Kochadhaman and Bahadurganj. It stood second in another two – Amour and Kishanganj. Later that year in October, the party won the Kishanganj assembly segment by-poll.

Kochadhaman is the only seat where AIMIM had unofficially announced its candidate a year in advance. Mohammad Izhar Asfi ventured into politics as panchayat mukhiya in 2002; he unsuccessfully contested assembly elections from Kochadhaman in February 2005 and October 2005 against the then RJD candidate Akhtarul Iman. Later, when Iman’s confidant Mujahid Alam joined the JD(U) to contest against him, Asfi supported Iman. Izhar Asfi joined the AIMIM during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and it is said that Iman had promised him the ticket from Kochadhaman, which Iman represented as an RJD MLA between 2005 and 2014.

What made the election easy for Asfi was that his main contender was the sitting JD(U) MLA Mujahid Alam and not a Mahagathbandhan candidate. Kochadhaman has a record of not electing an NDA candidate. When Mujahid Alam won in the 2014 by-polls, the JD(U) was not with the BJP. When he won in 2015, the JD(U) was part of the Mahagathbandhan. That Mujahid Alam would lose the election was a foregone conclusion the day that the JD(U) went back to the NDA and he did oppose the move.

The AIMIM was able to project the contest as a direct contest with the BJP. Asfi supporters would call Mujahid a “Bhajpa ka ummeedwaar (BJP candidate)”. The JD(U) failed to counter this narraitve and the best they could come up with was “sarkar tou NDA ki hi banegi, phir sarkar mein aapka kaun hoga (It’s going to be an NDA government again, who will represent you in government then)”.

Also read: Why AIMIM Is Unlikely to Emerge as a Major Force in the Bihar Elections

The RJD lacks leadership in Kochadhaman. When Akhtarul Iman left in 2014, Intekhab Bablu led the party as the district president. He met an unfortunate death in a road accident in 2018. It fell upon his wife Seema Intekhab to make the party prominent in the area. Later, the RJD gave the command to a young face, Sarwar Alam, whose wife is Kishanganj’s Zila Parishad chairman. When it came to ticket distribution, the party tried to lure the sitting JD(U) MLA Mujahid Alam. He told me in an interview that the RJD promised him “money, ministry and even a Lok Sabha ticket”. When Mujahid did not join the RJD, the ticket was given to Sarwar Alam’s father, Shahid Alam, who stood third with just 16.18% of the votes.

Amour, where Iman won, is constantly devastated by flood and migration and keeps looking for a ray of hope. In 2010, Saba Zafar became the BJP’s first-ever Muslim MLA in Bihar.

Congress stalwart Abdul Jalil Mastan, a six-time MLA known for his humble lifestyle, was already facing anti-incumbency in Amour. Mastan put the last nail in his coffin when he addressed Owaisi as ‘maweshi (Cattle)’ and threatened him in Rahul Gandhi’s presence. Mastan had said, “I don’t call him Owaisi, I call him maweshi (Cattle) who has come to graze… We will break his teeth and waist and send him back to Hyderabad.”

The AIMIM also succeeded in uniting different Muslim sects in Seemanchal. The five seats where the party won are dominated by Surjapuri and Kulahiya Muslims. In Amour, AIMIM candidate Akhtarul Iman and Congress candidate Abdul Jalil Mastan are Surjapuri Muslims, while the JD(U)’s Saba Zafar is a Kulahiya.

The AIMIM feared that if Kulahiya Muslims vote for Zafar, he could easily win with help of well-guarded NDA voters. Luck favoured the AIMIM and the son of the tallest Kulahiya Muslim leader, late Taslimuddin’s son, Shahnawaz, joined the party at the very last moment. Shahnawaz, who contested from Jokihat, also campaigned in Amour and Baisi along with Owaisi.

Apart from Amour, the AIMIM also gained from Surjapuri-Kulahiya unity in Jokihat and Baisi.

IMIM Bihar president Akhtarul Iman after winning from Amour. Photo: By arrangement

In Baisi, the AIMIM fielded Syed Ruknuddin, a former independent MLA who had later joined the JD(U). Ruknuddin is neither a Surjapuri nor a Kulahiya Muslim and was contesting against a six-time RJD MLA Abdus Subhan, a Surjapuri. Abdus Subhan no doubt was also facing huge anti-incumbency. Like Amour, Baisi’s Muslims were also looking to vote for change.

The AIMIM’s lead in Bahadurganj during the 2019 Lok Sabha election drew many contenders for a ticket here. Former JD(U) candidate Musawwir Alam, former RJD candidate Anzar Nayeemi, former NCP candidate Mansoor Alam, everyone who wanted to unseat the four-time Congress MLA Tausif Alam joined the AIMIM. Interestingly, Tausif Alam is the son-in-law of AIMIM’s Kochadhaman candidate Izhar Asfi.

The Congress tried to counter the AIMIM by attacking Owaisi. The party’s leader and Urdu poet Imran Pratapgarhi held many rallies for Tausif in Bahadurganj to counter Owaisi. Pratapgrahi would ask Owaisi to show a photograph of him from Shaheen Bagh protest and question him about his ‘friend’ Telangana chief minister K. Chandrashekar Rao’s alleged proximity to the BJP. But, none of it worked.

What I have gathered is that even anti-AIMIM Muslim voters in Seemanchal accept Owaisi as someone who always stands up for the community. Attacking Owaisi only backfired for the Congress in Bahadurganj and Amour.

AIMIM’s Asaduddin Owaisi at a rally in Bihar’s Kishanganj. Photo: Asaduddinowaisi/Facebook

A different scenario

But the scenario in Jokihat in Araria district was different and its win came under unlikely circumstances. One would have to go back to 2017 to trace the origin a series of events that saw the AIMIM win.

Late RJD MP and former Union minister Taslimuddin died in 2017, leading to a by-election in the Araria Lok Sabha seat. His second son Sarfraz Alam, who was an MLA, won the poll. Consequetly, a bypoll was held in the Jokihat assembly seat. Taslimuddin’s youngest son Shahnawaz won the seat as an RJD candidate in 2018.

But, Sarfraz lost the Lok Sabha elections in 2019 and now wanted the Jokihat seat back from his brother. Shahnawaz claims that Tejashwi Yadav had assured him of the ticket but gave it to his brother instead.

On the other hand, the AIMIM had already announced former JD(U) candidate Murshid Alam as its candidate for Jokihat. Just a day before the last day of the nomination, Shahnawaz joined the AIMIM and the party changed its candidate.

The AIMIM had already developed a following in Jokihat under the leadership of Maulana Abdullah Saleem Chaturvedi. Shahawaz got a team of workers ready for elections; he cried injustice at the hands of the RJD and Owaisi’s two rallies did the rest.

AIMIM MLA from Jokihat Shahnawaz receiving his certificate after counting. Photo: By arrangement

A setback in Kishanganj

Despite, the AIMIM’s five successes, its defeat in the Kishanganj assembly is a setback. AIMIM’s Qamrul Hoda had won this Congress bastion in October last year, making the grand old party lose its deposit. A year later, the Congress took the seat back, pushing the AIMIM to third position.

A week before polling, I saw an old-time party worker from Kishanganj assembly in Owaisi’s Kochadhaman rally. He told, “We will be with the AIMIM till Akhtarul Iman is in the party. But, this time, we can’t work for Qamrul Hoda.”

Not just workers, even leaders seemed unhappy with Hoda’s performance in just a year. Senior party leaders wanted Hoda to meet the people every day for two hours at the party office in Kishanganj. He didn’t oblige.

A day before voting, I asked a poultry seller in the Kishanganj town market which way he saw the constituency go this time. He showed his palm (Congress symbol) and explained, “The MLA didn’t do anything during the lockdown.” I asked, “Did Congress MP Jawaid help?” He nodded his head.

The Congress was helped by the fact that its rebel leaders came back to help its candidate Izharul Hussain, an old-time party worker.

On the other hand, there were rebels in the AIMIM and BJP camps. AIMIM’s 2015 candidate Tasiruddin contested as an independent, although he did not impact the result. Outraged by the BJP’s decision to not field a Rajbansi candidate, the community rebelled against the party. Their candidate Manoj Singh took away 1,419 votes from the BJP. That the Congress’s margin of victory in Kishanganj was just 1,381 shows that the saffron party could have won if it had the support of the Rajbansi community.

Tanzil Asif is an independent journalist based in Seemanchal, Bihar. He runs a hyper-local news platform Main Media in the region, and tweets at @tnzl.