Jungle Raj and ‘katta culture’ dominated PM’s poll speeches in Bihar

To the surprise of many in Bihar, neither Prime Minister Narendra Modi nor Union Home minister Amit Shah barely mentioned Operation Sindoor (7-10 May, 2025) in their election rallies. Even more telling was the absence of any mention of Pakistan in their speeches.

It is telling because following the attack by terrorists at Pahalgam on 22 April this year, the prime minister had actually rushed to Bihar and not Pahalgam to announce that his government would punish the culprits and drag them out from the bowels of the earth, if necessary.

It had seemed like the Pulwama moment in 2019 before the general election that year when the Modi-Shah duo and the BJP milked the terror attack on a CRPF convoy to the full. Perhaps Operation Sindoor, they felt, have faded from public memory; or they may have been advised to steer clear and avoid any mention of the military operation lest they allow the opposition to point out about the losses of aircrafts and the US president brokering or ‘ordering’ a ceasefire.

They did half-heartedly mention the threat from infiltrators and Amit Shah blamed the Opposition for pandering to the infiltrators and creating a corridor for them through Bihar and West Bengal. The Ghuspiathia narrative was blunted by the SIR which did not apparently find foreign nationals in the electoral rolls.

Uncharacteristically, both Modi and Shah appeared to be struggling with their speeches. While Shah dwelt on the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya and promised an equally majestic Mandir in Sitamarhi to honour Ram’s consort Sita, Modi referred to wild and violent Bhojpuri songs allegedly used by the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) with liberal references to ‘six shotters’, a slang for revolvers with six bullets in them.

The PM got carried away and accused the opposition of promoting kattas or country-made pistols in Bihar. In one of his speeches he declared that in Bihar the opposition had promoted the cult of the ‘Katta’ which allowed criminals to point pistols and say, ‘hands up’ to people.

The prime minister also repeatedly dwelt on the alleged differences between the RJD and Congress. Referring to the seemingly late announcement of Tejashwi Yadav as the opposition’s chief-ministerial-face, the PM dramatically said that he had reliable information that in a closed room, the RJD had forced the Congress at gun-point to accept Tejashwi Yadav as chief minister (RJD ney Congress ki Kan-patti par katta rakh kar CM pad chori kar liya).

The allusions did little to enhance the stature of the prime minister. Tejashwi Yadav ignored the theatrical statements and merely expressed his surprise at the prime minister using such language. While lawlessness in Bihar has indeed increased and there have been multiple instances of criminals entering the ICU units of hospitals in Patna to kill targets, this has happened under the watch of the NDA government in the state.

Similarly, if there are indeed infiltrators, it was the responsibility of the home minister and central forces and agencies to deal with it, the opposition pointed out.

Both Modi and Shah kept referring to the ‘Jungle Raj’ during 1990-2005. Tejashwi Yadav pointed out that the NCRB data indicate that the period between 2005 and 2025 has recorded a lot more crime than the 15-year-period when there was a RJD government in the state. He also pointed out that till 2000 Bihar was a bigger state and had not yet been bifurcated.

The mining mafia and the lobbies in the industrial belt which went over to Jharkhand, which was created in 2000, also affected the record. While the NDA government had to handle a smaller state, it failed to curb crime.

In Siwan, Amit Shah invoked memory of late Mohammad Shahabuddin, RJD MP, to caution the electorate not to vote for his son Osama Shahab and other opposition candidates. But this narrative too fell flat because of the murder at Mokama Jan Suraaj party’s key campaigner, Dular Chand Yadav allegedly by the henchmen of the NDA candidate and the local don Anant Singh. Singh had to be arrested and union minister Lallan Singh entrusted with managing his campaign.

The Union minister’s controversial statement in which he allegedly exhorted Anant Singh’s supporters to ensure that rival candidates and supporters are confined to their home on the polling day too knocked the bottom of the narrative. Shah has not uttered a word on the incident.

The attempt to drive a wedge between the RJD and the Congress by the prime minister reeked of desperation. Infighting and lack of trust and coordination within the NDA, between JD(U), LJP and the BJP has been widely talked about during the campaign. The PM’s bid to point at alleged differences in the Maha Gathbandhan looked an embarrassing attempt to divert attention.

While the duo from Gujarat waxed eloquent on 7 November to use the 150^th anniversary of the composition of Vande Mataram by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay for the election campaign, accusing the Congress for dropping some stanzas while adopting it as the national song, both maintained complete silence the next day on the disastrous Demonetisation which was announced on 8 November, 2016 at four hours’ notice.

Whether the duo have helped or harmed the NDA’s prospects in the state will be known on the counting day. However, whatever be the outcome, the duo’s campaign in Bihar in 2025 will for long be a case study of how bombast and ‘filmy’ dialogues by the two ‘tallest’ leaders of the BJP left their audience, ferried to the venue, listless.