UP bypolls: Pravin Kumar Nishad is the David who beat Goliath in Gorakhpur

A protege of the BSP creator-builder, Kanshi Ram, Dr Nishad's plank was carving out a sub quota for the Nishads within the 28 per cent reservation earmarked in education and jobs for the OBCs

Pravin Kumar Nishad has joined the roll of honour of the giant slayers in India’s electoral history but for the 29-year-old, the names of Ravindra Pratap Singh and Raj Narain invokes nothing. Ravindra Pratap and Narain respectively  vanquished Sanjay Gandhi and Indira Gandhi from Amethi and Rae Bareli in the 1977 elections after Emergency was lifted. In Pravin’s words, he breached the “Gorakhpeeth fortress”, seat of the Nath “sampradaya”, a Hindu monastic order of which the present custodian is Yogi Adityanath, Uttar Pradesh’s chief minister. Pravin’s claim might smack of hyperbole because he and his family are votaries of the same brotherhood. They trace their ancestry to Matsyendranath, who was “guru” to Gorakhnath, the Nath “sampradaya” founder and never embark on an important endeavour without seeking the blessings of the temple which gives Gorakhpur its name.

When Pravin put down the BJP’s candidate, Upendra Dutt Shukla in the Gorakhpur by-poll, it was nothing short of stellar. This Lok Sabha seat was held uninterruptedly from 1991 to 2014 by a Gorakhnath representative who was Yogi’s mentor Mahant Avaidyanath and then Yogi himself. Neither the “Guru” nor the “chela” had formally joined the BJP but they adopted its symbol in an election. 

Mention another giant killer, Amitabh Bachchan who trounced the legendary Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna in 1984 and Pravin chuckled. He’s a film buff whose favourite star is Irfan Khan, the protagonist of “Paan Singh Tomar” and “Life of Pi”.  In the midst of electioneering, he heard Khan took ill.

Although it was a first, electioneering was not a grind for Pravin because he had strong back-ups at his disposal. His father, Sanjay Nishad, a homeopath,  was chief among them. There was the Samajwadi Party (SP) that fielded him on its symbol and its ally, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Nishads who swore by his father. 

Nishad Senior founded his party, the Nirbal Indian Shoshit Hamara Aaam Dal (Our Common Weak and Exploited Indian Party). Its acronym NISHAD instantly resonated with the Nishads, a prominent Other Backward Class (OBC) caste whose livelihood has traditionally been river-linked. Some Nishads are boatmen while others fish. They are variously known as Kewat, Bind, Mallah and Manjhi.  Because the party’s given name was a tongue twister, Dr Nishad called it the Nishad Party. 

A protégé of the BSP creator-builder, Kanshi Ram, Dr Nishad’s plank was carving out a sub quota for the Nishads within the 28 per cent reservation earmarked in education and jobs for the OBCs.He was convinced that the Nishads were short-changed of their job share by the well-off OBCs. 

Pravin’s family forsook their caste’s traditional occupation because they figured out that it would not take them anywhere. Barring the Nishads who migrated to Mumbai and made a lucrative business out of fishing, those who remained in UP were exploited by the rapacious upper caste contractors. The Mumbai fish traders fund the Nishad Party and arrived in strength to vote Pravin.  

Illustration: Ajay Mohanty

Pravin’s grandfather was a “subedar” in the army who fought the three wars waged since Independence and was decorated. The family learnt its first lessons in “patriotism” from the grandfather but Nishad Senior said he was never drawn to the BJP’s genre of “nationalism”. 
 

In 2008, Pravin graduated in mechanical engineering from the Noida Institute of Engineering and Technology after schooling at Gorakhpur’s Air Force school. He worked in an engineering firm at Bhiwadi in Rajasthan. Nishad Senior summoned him back to Gorakhpur after launching the Nishad Party in 2013 because he wanted to fight the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. Pravin was appointed as the spokesperson and an overall minder and his brother, Sarvan was tasked to head the youth wing. Sanjay Nishad lost the two elections he contested in 2014 and 2017 in conjunction with the Peace Party of India, a breakaway faction of the Apna Dal and the Jan Adhikar Party of Babu Singh Kushwaha, helmed by a former right-hand man of BSP chief Mayawati. 

He affirmed the BJP sought him out before the 2017 assembly polls but BJP sources denied the claim. Asked why the Nishad Party went the way of another family-centric outfit, Sanjay’s answer was, “I can’t allow my wife and sons to lounge at home in air-conditioned comfort and have the Nishads bear the brunt of agitations.”

Pravin’s tryst with street politics was in June 2015 when Nishad Party activists laid siege on the Lucknow-Gorakhpur railway line, demanding a sub-quota for the caste and confronted the police. An activist was killed allegedly by the railway police. The protests spurred the party to hold rallies across UP but Sanjay came to be known more as a “hard-as-nails” negotiator than a combatant.
 

He displayed his bargaining savvy when SP president Akhilesh Yadav approached him for an alliance.  Akhilesh had figured out that the 350,000 Nishad votes in Gorakhpur demanded a caste candidate. Nishad senior initially pitched for himself but the SP chief insisted he wanted a younger person like Pravin. Sanjay relented but not before extracting an assurance that he will be given a seat in the UP legislative council or a ticket in the Lok Sabha polls.     

Pravin kicked off his campaign after seeking the blessings of the family’s “guru” at Gorakhnath temple. His day started at six and ended after midnight during which time he shared his meals with village people who addressed him by his nickname, Santosh. He missed his fish curry with mustard masala, his wife Ritika Sahni and their two children. So what? Victory brought in an overdose of sweetness.