Laloo Yadavs Rise And Fall From Grace

This is as much a cry of anguish over the state of Bihar as it is a political biography of Laloo Prasad Yadav. The prologue sets the scene for the anger, frustration and cynicism that informs much of this story. It takes the reader on a tour of the sordid, filthy state: The stench of ponds that ragged and malnourished children must use for both drinking and defecating, morgue-like college laboratories, cows munching dirty sheets off the bodies of those patients lucky enough to have sheets in a Darbhanga hospital -- where open-stomach surgery is performed next to open drains with shaving blades, and attendants smoke bidis in operation theatres.

 

Thakur presents the neglect and underdevelopment of Bihar through the past decade of Laloo Yadav's rule, including his proxy rule through wife Rabri Devi, with anecdotes and figures of constantly falling indices. He rues the lack of policy initiatives or interest in development -- or use of experts, as by Andhra's Chandrababu Naidu -- by a leader who had a lot going for him when he took power in 1990. Thakur speaks regretfully of the lack of land reform, industrial development (even after a CII initiative took Yadav abroad to woo investment in 1995) or utilisation of central plan outlays for the state year after dismal year.

The book also, however, highlights the vigour with which Yadav has engineered social mobility and a sense of dignity among castes that had been treated worse than cattle for something like a thousand years, by simply standing rock-like by them and urging them to break the social chains of barbaric feudal oppression. Equally, it documents Yadav's success in preventing communal clashes even at the height of the Ayodhya fervour and giving the state's large Muslim communities a sense of security.

This book is for the most part an intimate account of Laloo Yadav in action -- and inaction. The reader might almost be standing on the lawn of the chief minister's bungalow watching supporters troop in, or lounge in the verandah of its hall along with various unsavoury hangers-on, or be in the bedroom upstairs, watching Rabri Devi crying over being forced to shoulder the burdens of high office. It's a laugh at many points, specially where it documents Yadav's antics and insincerity as a student leader who just happened to belong to the right caste and had an amazing flair for grabbing the limelight.

Thakur divides Yadav's decade in power into the pre- and post- fodder scandal phases. In the first, Yadav was able to use his bluster, drama, iconoclasm and buffoonery to effectively cover up the lack of administration or development. The scandal, which inexorably drew him in, gradually exposed the hollowness behind the image Yadav had created for himself. The dismal reality of Yadav's inability, and unwillingness, to lead Bihar on the road to development became apparent through the past five years.

Thakur traces the changing patterns of caste support through the 1990s from his vantage as a reporter covering Bihar and his interactions with Yadav at crucial junctures. He describes Yadav's own surprise, as he sat lonely and depressed after an arduous and uninspiring campaign on the verandah of the chief minister's bungalow in Patna, when word filtered in that he could survive in power after the assembly elections earlier this year -- mainly because he was still the best bet for Yadavs and Muslims, however cynical they might have become about his promises, and because he was able to successfully portray the opposition's cries of `jungle raj' as an attempt to restore upper caste suzerienity. Finally, Yadav's ability to make the wretched and the damned of the ages feel they could stand erect as long as he was around was enough to keep his wife in the chief minister's chair.