A government job per family within 20 days of coming to power, permanent jobs for women in self-help groups and contractual workers within 20 months, monthly financial aid to women, scrapping the central waqf law, and exempting toddy from the prohibition net were among major promises made by the Opposition Grand Alliance in its poll manifesto on Tuesday.
The 30-page document – titled Bihar Ka Tejashwi Pran (Bihar’s Tejashwi Resolve) – highlighted the alliance’s chief ministerial face, Tejashwi Yadav, and focussed on jobs, young people, women, extremely backward classes, and Muslims. It also promised to do away with the 50% cap on reservation if the INDIA bloc wins the two-phase elections next month.
“The promises made in the documents are pragmatic. I will fulfill them even if it requires sacrificing my life (praan),” said Yadav.
The seven-party opposition alliance is hoping to deny chief minister Nitish Kumar a fifth consecutive term in the November 6 and 11 elections, but has been besieged by internal squabbling over seats. The manifesto release, coinciding with the Chhath festival, was attended by leaders from all major constituents of the alliance, but senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi wasn’t present.
Yadav called Kumar “a puppet” in the National Democratic Alliance. “The BJP is just using the face of Bihar CM Nitish Kumar…BJP will not make Nitish Kumar the CM after the elections,” he added.
The NDA called the manifesto a “bunch of lies”. Union minister of state for home affairs Nityanand Rai said Yadav was trying to sell dreams. “Tejashwi Yadav and the Grand Alliance have released a bundle of false promises in the name of the manifesto. The people of Bihar know that these people make promises and, in the name of promises, want to establish jungle raj in Bihar once again,” said Rai.
The manifesto envisages permanent status and interest waivers for Jeevika didis (self-help group women) and contractual workers, a new law to curb paper leaks in exams, ₹2,500 a month to women from a financially weak background, under the “Mai-Behen Yojana”, subsidised LPG cylinders and free electricity up to 200 units per household, universal healthcare coverage and farmer support with minimum support prices covering input costs, strict measures to make Bihar crime-free, including enhanced policing and anti-communal initiatives, industrial incentives to halt youth exodus, and focussing on education, medicine, and farmer rewards, including restoration of APMC Act (Agricultural Produce Market Committee Act), guaranteed minimum support price (MSP) on all good grains and opening of mandis at the block-levels, to restore “Bihar’s self-respect.”
The manifesto also promises implementation of a law, on the lines of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, aimed at protecting extremely backward classes. The law was first envisaged at an ‘Ati Pichhda Sankalp’ launched last month by Rahul Gandhi. The manifesto said that if the INDIA bloc came to power, 300 students from the SC/ST communities will be sent abroad for higher education annually.
The manifesto has also promised “handing over to the Buddhist community temples dedicated to Lord Buddha, situated at Bodh Gaya” and said it will “do away with 50 per cent cap on reservations, through a resolution passed by the state legislature and the same would be sent to the Centre so that the legislation is placed in the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution and protected against judicial intervention”.
Hike in quotas for EBCs, Dalits and tribals, in panchayats and municipal bodies, was promised, as were IT parks, SEZs, dairy and agro-based industries, an education city and five new expressways.
The manifesto was released by Yadav in the presence of Congress’s Pawan Khera, Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) chief Mukesh Sahani and CPI(Marxist Leninist) Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya. Yadav described the manifesto as his personal “pran patra” (resolve document), outlining a five-year blueprint to address unemployment, migration, and lawlessness – issues he repeatedly blamed on the Nitish Kumar-led NDA government.
“We are not just promising; we have a roadmap to make Bihar number one. The NDA must reveal their CM face and vision;l stop the negativity,” Yadav said, urging voters to back the Opposition for a “crime-free and prosperous” state.
Yadav urged officials to stay impartial and alleged that officials in Bihar had been asked to create problems for Opposition candidates, and warned that everything will be videographed to foil the “authoritarian diktats”.
To a query about the expenses incurred to fulfil the promises, Yadav said he had a comprehensive blueprint that will also be released later. “NDA leaders made similar observations, when I had promised to offer 10 lakh government jobs,” he said.
Mukesh Sahani, the alliance’s deputy CM face, echoed the sentiment: “This is our Sankalp Patra for a new Bihar-jobs, justice and joy for every home.” The document also vows to protect Bihar’s interests amid central policies.
The NDA hit back. “What’s the harm in lying if they don’t expect to win? Tejashwi must reflect on why migration started under his family’s rule,” said Union minister Chirag Paswan.