The money play in Jharkhand in the Rajya Sabha elections appears to be destabilising the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government, with its ally Jharkhand Mukti Morcha even threatening to pull it down if its candidate loses.
The BJP thought it had distanced itself from the money power by dumping London-based NRI Anshuman Mishra, forcing him to withdraw from the race after BJP leader Nitin Gadkari came under attack from his own party leaders that he had sold the party to the moneybag.
JMM supremo Guruji Sibu Soren's deputy chief minister son Hemant Soren on Saturday rushed to New Delhi to persuade BJP president Nitin Gadkari and other seniors to reverse the party's decision to abstain from polls and vote for the victory of JMM candidate Sanjeev Kumar, a Supreme Court lawyer and the legal adviser of the party for the last 12 years.
The JMM is desperate as the party is divided on Sanjeev Kumar's candidature and two other moneybags in the fray are claiming to not only split the JMM votes but also secure votes of 11 other MLAs of former CM Babulal Marandi's Jharkhand Vikas Morcha.
Worried that the party faces a repeat of the 2008 Rajya Sabha elections when independent Parimal Nathwani defeated the party's official nominee, Kishori Lal, Guruji on Saturday issued a warning in Ranchi that the JMM would be compelled to review its ties if the BJP refused to budge from its stand to abstain from voting.
"The BJP had decided to abstain because of the controversy raked up by some party MLAs signing the nomination papers of Anshuman Mishra, but he has already withdrawn and hence the party should have no problem in voting to ensure victory of the JMM candidate," Hemant Soren said on arrival in Delhi.
He said the JMM's difficulty is that no whip can be issued to the party MLAs to vote only for its candidate while two businessmen in the fray when moneybags are out buying out the MLAs to win the March 30 election.
Two businessmen in the fray are Jamshedpur-based industrialist R K Agrawal and Kolkata-based real estate magnate Pawan Dhoot. Both are trying to secure maximum votes in the 81-member assembly and the scenario today shows the fight is now between the two, though there are three other candidates of the political parties.
While JMM has fielded the Guruji's lawyer disciple, the Congress has fielded its state president Pradip Balmuchu and the JVM its general secretary Pravin Singh. Marandi asserted that there will be no split in his party as all its 11 candidates will vote for Pravin Singh, and there is no question of electing any businessman.
Agrawal is banking on the good relations he enjoys with every party to claim he will garner the requisite number of votes while those campaigning for Dhoot, who runs Dhoot Group of Real Estate Companies, say some JMM and JVM MLAs as also those of AJSU and JD(U) and independents will get him elected.
If the BJP with the strength of 39 remains firm to abstain from voting, the effective number of voters is reduced to 42, which means a candidate needs more than 21 first preference votes to get elected.
No surprise that in that scenario even Balmuchu of the Congress gets elected, as the party has 16 MLAs and can count on support of the five Rashtriya Janata Dal members.
