RULING COALITION LOSES 4 PARLIAMENT SEATS IN 3 DIFFERENT

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 CALCUTTA 000526

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

PACOM FOR POLAD

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV IN
SUBJECT: RULING COALITION LOSES 4 PARLIAMENT SEATS IN 3 DIFFERENT
STATES


CALCUTTA 00000526 001.2 OF 002



1. (U) SUMMARY: On November 6, Congress and its ruling United
Progressive Alliance (UPA) partners lost all four contested
seats in Lok Sabha (national parliament) by-elections in Bihar,
Jharkhand and Assam. In Bihar, the opposition National
Democratic Alliance (NDA) won two seats, while in Jharkhand,
former Chief Minister Babulal Marandi, running as an
independent, won a landslide victory. In Assam, a candidate
from the recently-formed Muslim Assam United Democratic Front
(AUDF) Party easily defeated his Congress rival. The Congress
and BJP losses reflect how difficult it is for national parties
to deal with complex local politics, including purely local
issues, in elections in which regional and communal loyalties
increasingly take precedence over ideology. END SUMMARY


2. (U) In Bihar, the by-elections for the Nalanda and Bhagalpur
seats were held after the Janata Dal-United (JDU)'s Nitish Kumar
and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s Sushil Kumar Modi
resigned the seats early in 2006 to serve respectively as
Bihar's Chief Minister and the Deputy Chief Minister in the new
NDA Bihar government. Congress ally and UPA member Rashtriya
Janata Dal (RJD) lost both seats to the BJP and the JDU. Former
Union Civil Aviation Minister and the Muslim face of the BJP
Shahnawaz Hussain, won the Bhagalpur seat, defeating RJD
candidate Shakuni Chowdhury by nearly 50,000 votes. In Nalanda,
it was an easy victory for the JDU's Ram Swarup Prasad, who won
171,592 votes, many more than the combined vote totals of the
RJD-backed and former JDU Member of Parliament Arun Kumar
(53,840),and Communist Party of India's Gaya Singh (31,915).
These latest defeats seem to confirm that Railway Minister Lalu
Prasad Yadav's RJD party has still not recovered from its
November 2005 defeat in the Bihar state assembly elections.


3. (SBU) Contributing to the RJD's loss was Lalu's insistence
on fielding candidates against his own UPA allies - Congress,
Lok Janata Party (LJP),Nationalist Congress Party (NCP),
Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM),and the Communist Party
of India (CPI)--thereby splitting the UPA vote. Lalu's
candidates came second in both races. Lalu, sources said, had
made it clear to Congress and other allies that he would fight
the two seats to establish his influence and to demonstrate that
the UPA had no alternative but to work with the RJD. "His aim
was not to win the seats, but to come second and he has achieved
it," a Bihar leader said. LJP leader and Union Chemicals and
Fertilizer Minister Ram Vilas Paswan told the media after the
defeat that "some people were not interested in a unified fight
against the NDA." (Comment: Lalu's willingness to "lose" the
election is counter-intuitive. Lalu's influence has waned in
Bihar recently because his party has been compelled to share
power in a coalition. By increasing the strength of his NDA
rivals, Lalu feels that he will become the unifying voice of
opposition to the right-wing NDA, and easily win the next
election. End Comment.)


4. (U) The NDA faced a setback of its own in neighboring
Jharkhand, as it lost the Koderma seat, the only seat it carried
in the 2004 general elections. Former BJP Vice President and
the first Chief Minister of Jharkhand, Babulal Marandi, created
his own party, the Jharkhand Vikas Manch, after quitting the BJP
in May 2006 and resigning his Koderma Lok Sabha seat. Although
running as an independent, (his party has not officially
registered) Marandi defeated his nearest INC rival by a huge
margin of over 194,000 votes. The BJP candidate garnered so few
votes that he lost his security deposit.


5. (U) The ruling Congress in the state of Assam experienced a
shock, as the AUDF candidate Sirajuddin Ajmal won the Jamunamukh
seat, defeating his nearest Congress rival by over 14,000 votes.
The seat had become a point of prestige between the Assam's INC
Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi and Assam's Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind
President Badruddin Ajmal who heads the AUDF. The by-election
was held after Badruddin, who won from two seats, vacated the
Jamunamukh seat. The AUDF fielded Sirajuddin, younger brother
of Badruddin, who defeated INC candidate Khalilur Rahman. After
the victory, AUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal boldly announced to the
media that if Congress continues to ignore Muslims in the state,
the party will soon be wiped-out.


6. (U) The AUDF was formed in November 2005 during the run-up

CALCUTTA 00000526 002.2 OF 002


to Assam's 2006 state assembly elections. Many of AUDF's
leaders are former Congress members upset by what they perceive
to be the party's lack of attention to Muslim concerns. Many
Muslims had concluded that the Congress Party passively accepted
the Indian Supreme Court's July 2005 verdict declaring the
Illegal Migrants Determination by Tribunal Act (IMDTA) of 1983
unconstitutional. Only applicable in Assam, the IMDTA had made
identification and deportation of illegal Bangladeshi migrants,
who are mainly Muslims, virtually impossible. Passage of the
IMDTA had spurred Muslim votes for Congress. The AUDF's split
from and victory over Congress reflects the growing political
strength of the Muslim community in Assam.


7. (SBU) COMMENT: The recent by-election results demonstrate
the need for national parties to pay sufficient heed to the
increasing complexity and relevance of local politics. The
Congress lost in Bihar because Lalu was more concerned about
demonstrating his influence in his state rather than working
with other UPA parties to support a consensus candidate. Lalu's
counterproductive behavior is no surprise to those familiar with
his personality.


8. (SBU) In Jharkhand, Marandi's victory as an independent is a
sign that the people, fed up with corruption and five different
governments in Jharkhand's six year existence, are looking for a
leader who can move the paralyzed state forward. In Assam, the
new AUDF party flexed its muscles to demonstrate the growing
strength of the Muslim vote resulting from the demographic shift
brought about by the influx of Bangladeshi migrants. This
fracturing of the political milieu in Assam is likely to inhibit
the GOI's efforts to tackle the continuing insurgency in the
state.JARDINE