DESPITE the two main national political parties, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party, increasingly being pushed aside by regional players elsewhere for their failure to address the basic issues confronting the “aam admi”, politics in Chhattisgarh typically remains bipolar. The absence of a forceful alternative has forced the voter here to choose between the two. It is only now that the Left parties have started to assert themselves although one would ha ve thought that there was space for an alternative party to emerge in one of the States worst affected by Left extremism. The Communist Party of India and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) are contesting one seat each in the naxalite-affected areas. But their presence at the moment is merely indicative of the beginning of a new phase and not a decisive factor in the elections to the 11 Lok Sabha seats scheduled for April 16.

The BJP is expected to repeat its performance in the 2008 Assembly elections when it won 50 seats in the 90-member House, thanks to Chief Minister Raman Singh. Widely perceived as a “gentleman politician”, Raman Singh’s charisma has even overshadowed the persona of the party’s Prime Minister-designate, L.K. Advani. In Chhattisgarh, a vote for the BJP is not so much a vote for Advani as Prime Minister; it is a vote for Raman Singh. His populist schemes have even obscured the apparent failure of his government to curb the naxalite problem, which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described as the biggest threat to national security.

What has made Raman Singh so popular are some of his schemes such as rice for Rs.2 a kilo for families below the poverty line and at Re.1 a kilo for families with Antyodaya cards (very poor families), free salt for poor families, financial assistance for the marriage of poor girls, free bicycles for school-going girls, free books for poor children, increased scholarships for tribal and other poor children, a subsidy of Rs.100 per gas connection for women and 50 per cent reservation for women in panchayati raj institutions. Loans at 3 per cent interest, 24-hour power supply, free power to those with five horse-power pumps and Rs.270 for a quintal of paddy as bonus have endeared him to farmers. His government also distributed free footwear to tribal people who are involved in collecting tendu leaves. That the Congress has included the scheme of rice at Rs.2 a kilo for poor families in its manifesto is an indication of the popularity of his schemes.

The Congress hopes to improve its tally substantially from the one seat it got in the 2004 elections. The BJP swept the polls last time with 10 seats and 47.78 per cent of the votes. The Congress, which was a divided house then, polled 40.16 per cent of the votes. Former Chief Minister Ajit Jogi was the only Congress candidate who got elected. He won the Mahasamund seat defeating former Congressman Vidya Charan Shukla, who contested on the BJP ticket. Jogi won the election from a hospital bed. He was hospitalised following an accident during election campaign. This time both leaders have put aside their differences and the united face of the party makes the Congress optimistic about increasing its tally at least to four.

According to senior Congress leaders, besides unity, the popularity of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) introduced by the United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre is working in the party’s favour. They feel the scheme has generated enough employment in rural areas so as to make people want to vote for the Congress. This optimism, however, appears to be slightly misplaced. Extensive interaction with people in the State reveals that the NREGS has generated more discontent than goodwill and the number of people denied employment is far too great to help the party in any way. “There was so much corruption in the implementation and so few people got work that this is hardly going to make any impact,” says Gautam Bandopadhyaya, an activist in Raipur.

PTI

Chief Minister Raman Singh celebrates after the victory in the Assembly elections in 2008. The BJP campaign in Chhattisgarh is built around his charisma.

According to him, what can actually go in the Congress party’s favour is the clever caste calculation that it has done this time while distributing the ticket and the comparatively good image of the candidates, along with the party’s united face. “For the first time caste has taken predominance in Chhattisgarh, setting issues aside. Unfortunately, the State seems to be going the Bihar way as far as caste dominance in politics is concerned,” he says.

Congress leaders, however, see nothing wrong in this. Ravindra Shukla, the party’s spokesman in Raipur, says caste calculations will help the Congress win Korba, Kanker, Raipur and Bilaspur. In Durg and Rajnandgaon, where too the caste equation favours the party, the contest could be slightly tough, but the seats are “winnable”, he says. He says if the trend seen in the Assembly elections, in which the party lost to the BJP by a mere 1.04 per cent of the votes, continues, the party should do better than last time.

Surprisingly, the BJP government’s failure to curb the naxalite problem is not an issue at all even though it cost over 1,500 lives between 2004 and 2008. Moreover, the government’s misguided strategy of supporting Salwa Judum, the so-called people’s movement against naxalites, aggravated the problem, with thousands becoming homeless and living in relief camps. These people are left in the lurch as the government’s logistic support to the camps has wilted and they cannot even go back to their villages for fear of reprisals.

AKHILESH KUMAR

Congress president Sonia Gandhi with former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Ajit Jogi at an election meeting in Raigarh district during the campaign for the Assembly elections in 2008.

Political observers say the naxalite problem has become such a non-issue in these elections because it substantially affects only two seats, Bastar and Sarguja, and partly affects Kanker. Since the two main parties have been equally inept in dealing with the problem, no one talks about it. As for the common people, they have come to realise that if they want to live in the naxalite-affected areas they will have to compromise with the naxalites. “In those areas, people do what the naxalites ask. It is no longer a fight with them, so there is peace,” says Y.N. Bhandari, a Forest Department official in Keshkal in Kanker Lok Sabha constituency. Bhandari has been unable to go to his native Narayanpur village for fear of naxalites. There is a general perception that the BJP and the Congress “buy” peace with the naxalites.

“But there is hardly any evidence to prove this,” says M.K. Nandi, State CPI(M) secretary. He says the Left has now decided to “tackle” this problem by contesting from here; the CPI(M)’s Balsingh is contesting from Sarguja and the CPI’s Manish Kunjam from Bastar. Both these seats are held by the BJP. There is not much hope of winning them, admits Nandi, saying the Left forces do not have the resources.

He agrees that these elections will generally see the continuation of the trend witnessed in the Assembly elections and the BJP will emerge the winner. But he says the Congress will improve its tally because “Congressmen are united this time and some of the party’s candidates are good”. •