George was against Nitish for CM; Nitish takes revenge

By Our Correspondent
There is more to the denial of a Lok Sabha ticket to fiery trade union leader George Fernandes than meets the eye. More than his failing health, his covert opposition to naming Nitish Kumar as the chief ministerial candidate during the 2000 Assembly polls cost him the Janata Dal (United) – JD(U) — ticket to contest the Muzaffarpur seat in north Bihar.

The sitting MP has been unceremoniously shown the door apparently at the behest of  Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who is known in political circles as a “silent assassin.” After parting ways with Lulu Prasad Yadav, Kumar waited for more than a decade to extract his revenge when he humbled his beet noire in the 2005 Assesmbly elections. According to those privy to the meeting before the 2000 Assembly polls, Kumar’s name for the chief ministership in the event of the NDA coming to power was proposed by BJP leader Lal Krishna Advani even as Fernandes dithered over the issue.

Retribution came the same year when Jaya Jaitley, a close aide of Fernandes, was denied nomination to the Rajya Sabha. Even Fernandes, the sitting MP from Nalanda was forced to shift to Muzaffarpur during the 2004 Lok Sabha polls after the then Barh Lok Sabha seat became too hot for Nitish Kumar to handle. Fernandes subsequently lost the JD(U) presidency to Sharad Yadav in 2006.

The ultimate humiliation came when he was denied re-nomination from Muzaffarpur which had elected him by a record margin in 1977 while he was in jail in connection with the infamous Baroda dynamite case. He is now in the fray to retain his seat as an independent candidate. He had earlier represented this constituency in 1980, 1989 and 1994. Though “age and poor health” has been cited as reasons for denying a ticket to Fernandes, Capt Jaynarain Nishad, the man chosen to replace the founder of the JD(U), is just five months younger than Fernandes. If Fernandes was opposed to the projection of Nitish Kumar as chief minister candidate, Nishad had also joined hands with Ram Vilas Paswan against Sharad Yadav when the Dalit leader broke away from the JD to form the Lok Janashakti Party (LJP) in 2000.

Moreover, when the five JD(U) MPs, including Fernandes, resigned from the Lok Sabha on November 8, 2008 in protest against the Centre’s failure to check the assault on Biharis in Maharastra by MNS workers, all the MPs had been assured that they would be given tickets. Barring Fernandes, the four others have been re-nominated.

Whether Fernandes wil meet his Waterloo in Muzaffarpur, the constituency he made his own several times, is a matter of conjecture, but his decision to contest as an independent has certainly emboldened those seeking to make him a rallying point in facilitating the fall of the Nitish Kumar regime.

The Chief Minister was cautious while reacting to the decision of George Fernandes to contest the elections as an independent candidate. “It was our effort to keep him out of the Lok Sabha polls on health grounds. Even his family members were opposed to his decision. But if he still wants to contest on the instigation of some disgruntled leaders let him contest. What can we do?” Nitish Kumar said.

But as a goodwill gesture, the JD(U) leadership has decided against taking disciplinary action against George Fernandes keeping in view his stature and contribution to the party.

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