Nitish wapsi: Bihar chief minister who trounced the PM

The sweltering heat of May 2014 had sent a majority of non-NDA leaders in Bihar into hiding. Some, undaunted by their humiliating defeat in the Lok Sabha polls, were planning trips to the salubrious climes of Europe. Others, stunned by the Narendra Modi juggernaut, were speaking of the danger the new dispensation could pose to the idea of India.

But, one man was drawing lessons from his defeat and plotting his next move. He could very well have taken the victory lap with Modi, but breaking the alliance with BJP had left him bruised and isolated. As is his style, Nitish Kumar withdrew into a shell at his Birchand Patel Marg residence in Patna and took two decisions: to resign from the chief ministership and reach out to Lalu Prasad, his friend-turned-adversary.

Marginalized and irritable all through the LS campaign, Lalu's biggest fear was the political wilderness staring at him. Either the erstwhile friends could come together or slide into oblivion. So when Nitish, who once left the Janata Dal to protest against the Yadavization of Bihar politics, called up Lalu on the evening of May 16 last year, the day the Lok Sabha results were out. Lalu The RJD strongman was initially standoff-ish but called back the next morning to seal the pact. The two were back in business together.

The combine was aptly called the Mahagathbandhan, the grand alliance that represented a formidable chunk of Bihar's highly-fragmented caste calculus - Yadavs, Kurmis, Keoris and Muslims. There were doubts about the Extremely Backward Castes (EBCs), with whom Nitish's one-time confidant Jitan Ram Manjhi was believed to have walked over to the saffron camp. But as the results have shown, big sections of EBCs stayed with Nitish as also sections of non-Paswan, non-Musahar Dalits.

Nitish and Lalu had to complement each other, not compete. In the run-up to the Bihar assembly polls and all through the campaign, Nitish ensured there were no ego clashes; occasionally, after campaigning for the day was over, he would go across to Lalu's residence and fine-tune the intricacies of a joint campaign, including division of labour: Lalu would match PM Modi, Amit Shah and others in decibel level, while Nitish would campaign quietly. However, his strong stand against the BJP was also making him appear more than an able administrator - in this election he was also positioned as a 'principled' politician.