While the contest for tribal votes has intensified in election-bound Jharkhand, emerging trends suggest that non-tribal seats will also play an important role in deciding the outcome of the upcoming Assembly election, which is shaping up into a fierce battle of alliances. The State will go to the polls in two phases scheduled on November 13 and November 20, with the counting of votes on November 23.

On October 1, the Loktantra Bachao Abhiyan (Save Democracy Campaign), or LBA, led by a group of rights bodies, released a public manifesto in Ranchi on the vision of the Jharkhand movement “Abua Jharkhand, Abua Raj” (Our Jharkhand, Our Rule) and urged political parties committed to communal harmony and constitutional values to include its demands in their manifestos.

While taking note of the successful initiatives in line with public expectation by the Hemant Soren government, the LBA statement underlined the many promises that were still pending. They include the enactment of a law against mob lynching and the notification of the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Rules.

“Action should be taken within the first six months of the formation of the government on jal [water], jangal [forest], zameen [land], identity, Adivasi autonomy, and freedom from exploitation,” the LBA demanded. It also called for the formation of a Displacement and Rehabilitation Commission to enable the distribution of land to the displaced landless, Dalits, and poor farmers.

Against this, the campaigns of the main political parties continue to be on emotive issues and identity politics. It has evolved into a battle of alliances, where social coalitions and community voting patterns seem to matter more than issues.

The BJP’s campaign during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s September 15 and October 2 visits revolved around Bangladeshi Muslims, whose alleged illegal infiltration has apparently undermined tribal interests. It accused the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) of vote-bank politics and trying to change the State’s identity, and promised to implement the National Register of Citizens in Jharkhand.

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Tribal people constitute 26 per cent of the electorate and have 28 reserved seats. Muslims are 14.5 per cent of the voting population and have the ability to influence the outcome in 20 seats in 7 districts. In 11 others, they are present in good numbers.

In 2019, the BJP contested alone after its attempt to form an alliance with the All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU) led by Sudesh Mahto, a former National Democratic Alliance (NDA) constituent, failed; it won just 25 of the 81 seats in the Assembly. This time the party has formed an alliance with the AJSU and the Janata Dal (United), or JD(U), and is in talks with the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) led by Chirag Paswan. The two Bihar-based parties have considerable influence among non-tribal voters, who matter in 53 seats, including 9 seats reserved for Scheduled Castes (SCs).

The AJSU has influence over the Kurmi Mahto tribal community (16 per cent of the population) in at least 14 Assembly seats where the BJP performance was below par last time. However, it will have to contend with the emergence of Jairam Mahto of the Jharkhandi Bhasha Khatiyani Sangharsh Samiti given the fact that his appeal extends to youth across community lines.

In August, the Congress too joined the battle for the Kurmi Mahto vote when it replaced Rajesh Thakur, its privileged-caste (Bhumihar) State party chief, with Keshav Mahto Kamlesh, a Kurmi Mahto leader.

The Congress at one time had tall non-tribal leaders such as Sarfaraz Ahmad, Subodhkant Sahay, Furqan Ansari, Rajendra Singh, and Chandrashekhar Dubey but now needs the support of the tribal-dominated JMM to be in power. The daughters of Sahay and Singh lost from Ranchi and Dhanbad, respectively, in the 2024 Lok Sabha election.

BJP’s strategy

The BJP holds just 2 of the 28 tribal seats, down from 11 in 2014. However, its good performance in non-tribal and urban seats helped it win 25 seats in 2019 against the 37 it won in 2014. The strategy this time is to maintain the hold on these seats while trying to repeat its 2014 performance in the tribal seats. (In the 2019 Assembly election, the JMM won 30 seats and the Congress 16.) According to the 2011 Census, Other Backward Classes (OBCs) constitute 46.1 per cent and STs 26.2 per cent of the population in the State.

On the face of it, the BJP seems to have regained some lost ground in the past five years. In the 2024 Lok Sabha election, the voting pattern in the 14 Lok Sabha constituencies revealed that the BJP-AJSU alliance was ahead in 50 Assembly segments and the JMM-Congress in 31. According to the 2024 Lok Sabha voting pattern, the JMM leads in only 22 Assembly segments and the Congress in 7.

Non-tribal people are angry with political parties as the entire focus of the election has seemingly turned to tribal issues. Although Jharkhand was created as a land for tribal communities, they do not constitute the majority of the voters in the State. According to a leader of the JMM-led alliance, a large number of people from eastern Uttar Pradesh and the erstwhile undivided Bihar, from which Jharkhand was carved out in 2000, vote for non-tribal candidates and parties. This, he asserts, poses a challenge to the JMM-led alliance. For obvious reasons the BJP performed well in non-tribal Assembly seats in 2019, especially in the urban ones.

Meanwhile, Hemant Soren has held a number of meetings with top Congress leaders in Delhi, asserting that “all is well” for their alliance. In fact, some leaders who left the two-party alliance to join the BJP ahead of the 2019 election have since returned. For instance, Kunal Sarangi has rejoined the JMM, slamming the BJP as a party of multinationals. His return is a shot in the arm for the JMM as he has earned a name for his social work in East Singhbhum. Sukhdev Bhagat rejoined the Congress in 2022, and Jaiprakash Bhai Patel did so in March this year.

For the BJP, the return of its former leader Saryu Rai into the NDA fold, as a member of the JD(U), is a big positive. He left the party before the 2019 election and contested as an Independent against the then Chief Minister, Raghubar Das, in Jamshedpur East. Rai’s rebellion cost the BJP all 14 Assembly seats in the Kolhan region (comprising East Singhbhum, Seraikela Kharsawan, and West Singhbhum districts). Rai’s return was facilitated after the BJP agreed to give him one seat as a JD(U) candidate. Besides, with former JMM Chief Minister Champai Soren joining the BJP in August and the Congress party’s Geeta Koda doing so in February, the party is confident of retrieving lost ground.

However, it is the tribal question that stares the BJP in the face, ironically in a State where the RSS-backed Vanvasi Kalyan Kendra has been active and the BJP’s Vananchal State pitch has had some resonance. The party is not taking it easy.

After its experiment with a non-tribal Chief Minister (Raghubar Das) cost it the 2019 Assembly election, the BJP brought back the popular Santhal leader Babulal Marandi to lead the party. It also brought into its fold Sita Soren, JMM leader Shibu Soren’s rebel daughter-in-law, and fielded her from Dumka in the Lok Sabha election. Geeta Koda contested from Chaibasa.

The party, however, failed to win any of the tribal-dominated seats in the Lok Sabha election, which was fought in the wake of an emotional campaign by the JMM after Hemant Soren was forced to resign as Chief Minister following his arrest and imprisonment in a corruption case by the Enforcement Directorate.

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Now, using some well-known tribal faces, the BJP hopes to win a few Assembly seats, where it plans to field even those who lost the Lok Sabha election. As such, apart from Geeta Koda in Chaibasa, Sita Soren in Dumka, and its former Chief Minster Arjun Munda in Kharsawan, the BJP plans to field Champai Soren from Saraikela, and former JMM MLA Lobin Hembrom from the Rajmahal region.

Both Champai Soren and Lobin Hembrom are the JMM’s founding leaders. While Champai rebelled against Hemant Soren after being dropped as Chief Minister after the Lok Sabha election, Lobin Hembrom was expelled from the party after he contested as an Independent from the Rajmahal Lok Sabha seat against the party’s decision.

With this line-up, the BJP hopes to improve its performance in tribal areas. “The BJP’s target is to win 10-12 of the 28 tribal seats with the help of these tribal leaders as it is confident of a good show in the urban non-tribal seats,” said a leader. Besides, in 18 seats falling in the Santhal Pargana region, the Muslim-versus-tribal discourse could become a worry for the JMM.

Whether the BJP’s confidence will pay off, as it did in Haryana, is the big question. But one thing is certain: Jharkhand is bracing for a steely battle of nerves.