Begusarai, a politically significant constituency in Bihar, has long been dominated by the Communist Party of India (CPI), earning it the sobriquet “Leningrad of Bihar” or “Mini Moscow.” The CPI’s dominance stemmed from its opposition to the alleged feudalism practiced by the Congress party. Tragically, over a hundred political workers from both the CPI and Congress have lost their lives in violent clashes over the years.
In 2014, the BJP made its presence felt in Begusarai’s political arena when its candidate, Bhola Singh, emerged victorious in the Lok Sabha election. The party’s success reached its peak in 2019 when Giriraj Singh, the BJP nominee, defeated CPI candidate Kanhaiya Kumar, a former president of the Jawaharlal Nehru University Student’s Union, by a margin of over four lakh votes.
The Begusarai constituency has traditionally been a stronghold of the upper caste Bhumihar community. Since India’s independence, every winning candidate has hailed from this community, except in 2009 when Janata Dal (United) candidate Monazir Hassan broke the trend. In the upcoming election, the BJP’s Giriraj Singh, a Bhumihar, will face Awadhesh Kumar Rai, a former three-time CPI MLA from the Bachhwara Assembly constituency, who belongs to the backward Yadav caste.
Among the 21 lakh voters in Begusarai, Bhumihars number around three lakh, while Yadavs and Muslims constitute over 2.5 lakh voters each. However, as Abhishek Kumar, a young voter and news portal operator, points out, “backward and extremely backward class voters outnumber all these caste groups in the constituency.”
In the 2019 election, the Opposition’s votes were split between the CPI and the Rashtriya Janata Dal, which fielded their own candidates. This division contributed to Giriraj Singh’s comfortable victory. This time, however, the Opposition has united behind a single candidate, Awadhesh Kumar Rai.
“This time, our candidate will receive the support of all the Opposition mahagathbandhan parties. Votes will not be divided this time, and I am confident that the CPI will reclaim the Begusarai seat in this election,” asserted Shatrughan Prasad Singh, a former CPI MP who represented Begusarai from 1996 to 1998. He currently serves as the chairman of the party’s State executive central committee and is spearheading the party’s poll campaign in Begusarai.
Yogendra Sharma holds the distinction of being the first CPI MP from Begusarai, elected in 1967. The party has represented the Begusarai Lok Sabha constituency, as well as the erstwhile Ballia LS constituency, four times in total: 1967, 1980, 1989, and 1996. The Congress party has also held the constituency on several occasions since 1952. Ballia was separated from the Begusarai Lok Sabha constituency in 2009.
Presently, the Begusarai Lok Sabha seat encompasses seven Assembly constituencies: Teghra and Bakhri (CPI), Begusarai and Bachhwara (BJP), Sahebpur Kamal and Cheriabariyarpur (RJD), and Maithani (JD-U).
The incumbent BJP MP, Giriraj Singh, has drawn criticism from within his own Bhumihar community for his outspoken nature and alleged divisive rhetoric. In a recent video that went viral on social media, Singh, who is also a Union Minister, was heard saying, “I do not need the vote of traitors… I strongly hate the tukde-tukde gang.”
“Any attempt to give communal color to the election is wrong. I have lodged a complaint,” countered Shatrughan Prasad Singh.
Resentment against Giriraj Singh in the constituency is so palpable that he was recorded in another video pleading with voters to support him solely for the sake of reelecting Narendra Modi as Prime Minister. “Meri galti ki saja Modi ji ko mat dijiye. Mujhko nahi, Modi ji ko vote dijiye (Please do not punish Modiji for my fault. Vote for Modi ji, not for me)”, he implored.
“Yes, we will vote for PM Modi, not for this loudmouth Giriraj Singh,” declared Ashwani Kumar, also known as Babluji, while speaking to The Hindu in Simaria village. Kumar is the grandson of the renowned Hindi poet Ramdhari Singh Dinkar, who also belonged to the Bhumihar community.
A group of backward class men from Pipradih village in the Bihat area – Upendra Yadav, Kailas Mahto, Shankar Rai, and others – were engaged in a game of cards on a sweltering afternoon on May 6 at a local temple. “He (Giriraj Singh) should not win this time because he injects Hindu-Muslim issues into everything and is very outspoken, but we can tell you that he will win because of PM Modi, though with a very thin margin,” they observed.
In another village near Pahadchak, Rameshwar Sharma, an upper caste Bhumihar, remarked, “Giriraj majboori hai, lekin Modi jaruri hai (Giriraj Singh is our compulsion, but PM Modi is essential).”
The Bihat area of Begusarai is home to over 50 widows whose husbands, who were either Communist or Congress party workers, lost their lives in violent political clashes during the 1970s and 1980s. “The bloodbath started when the Communists resisted the then-Congress party, which was dominated and supported by feudal lords at that time,” explained CPI state secretary Indu Bhushan Verma.
“But look how times change; this time, even the Congress leaders are campaigning in support of the CPI candidate… Time heals everything. For our candidate, this is the golden time, and we will win the election,” he added.
Begusarai will go to the polls in the fourth phase on May 13.
