Newsmaker: Pappu Yadav

Bihar strongman with many lives

Rajesh Ranjan, Pappu Yadav to friends, has managed to grow slim. Whether it is the spartan diet at Patna's Beur jail, where he was lodged after being convicted of the murder of Ajit Sarkar, CPI(M) leader from Purnea in 2008, or the whirlwind political activities of the past one year, the weight of the Lok Sabha member from Madhepura has come down from the previous 175 kg.

A dreaded criminal, a jailbird, a political exile and now a successful leader - Pappu has had many lives. He was acquitted from the murder charge in late 2013 by the Patna High Court and is now a hot political commodity in Bihar, as the state prepares for a decisive Assembly election later this year. So important is he that the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) expelled him from the party recently.

From which party will he contest? Who knows?

In March 2014, he joined the RJD. The party led by former chief minister Lalu Prasad was opposing Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (United). Despite his dodgy past, Pappu managed to win in the May 2014 elections. His wife, Ranjeet, also won from Supaul, on a Congress ticket.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s performance in the election - it won 22 of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar - forced both JD(U) and RJD to review their strategies.

During his previous tenure, Nitish had campaigned against people like Pappu - who had prospered under the preceding RJD regime because of the soft state that Bihar had become. He would have baulked at the idea of joining a party like the RJD that had welcomed Pappu to its folds, but what choice did Nitish now have?

The reality of 2015 is bitter.

With luck shining on him again, Pappu would have felt he had experienced two resurrections. His wife and he had managed to beat back the Modi wave in the state. He was raring to go. But the Lalu Prasad of 2015 was not the Lalu Prasad of 1998. Despite Pappu's appeal among the Yadavs, Lalu's own caste, the RJD chief was acutely aware of the recruit's criminal past. Lalu was looking for a political successor, too, because a criminal conviction in the fodder scam case had ensured his exit from electoral politics. Pappu thought he was it, and even said so several times at public meetings - the latest a couple of weeks ago.

Lalu didn't quite agree. RJD leader Ram Kripal Yadav was thrown out of the party when he dared to ask for the Pataliputra seat. Lalu had reserved it for this daughter, Misa. He was grooming sons Tejaswi and Tej Pratap to take over the family's political business. Naturally, Pappu's claim to the top seat in RJD would not be taken kindly.

Last week, Pappu was dismissed from the RJD. All the rituals were observed: He was given a show-cause notice and time to reply. Pappu called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and both the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party - allies of the BJP - have offered to accommodate him. Now, Pappu has all to gain by taking on Lalu's "feudal mindset" of passing the baton to his children. At his latest rally, the MP minced no words, claiming that five seats had been reserved in the RJD for Lalu's family in the coming Assembly elections. His surprising popularity in the Seemanchal region, especially among youths of the Yadav community, gives his attacks more teeth. Pappu has been organising agitations in the area against the breakdown of the state's health care system. He now openly claims that Bihar needs more leaders like him rather than Lalu.

With a career that has taken him from RJD to LJP and the Samajwadi Party, Pappu cares little what the colour of the flag is. That the younger Yadavs see a leader in him is the only important thing.