The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) front was bound by mistrust, more than trust. And the one man who is now causing pain to many allies in the front, Nitish Kumar, was not completely trusted by many allies.
Top sources in the INDIA front told News18: “We somehow were a bit wary. This doubt in him began to grow in the December meeting of Mumbai. There were telltale signs."
Yet no one wanted to ruffle the man who was their best bet to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Hindi heartland belt.
Sources say the problem intensified over time and many like the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Trinamool Congress (TMC) and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) began to warn the Congress of signs.
One of the first to speak out was the DMK. The reason was an altercation between Kumar and TR Baalu of the DMK. When Baalu requested that Kumar’s Hindi speech be translated into English, the Bihar CM snapped angrily. “We are Hindustanis and we need to speak in Hindi."
This took many by surprise but they all kept quiet. The fact was Kumar was a bit uncomfortable with his former ally, Congress, doing well only in the south and that the INDIA front could begin to look like a non-Hindi belt alliance. The point was made by the Janata Dal (United) (JDU), when the Congress lost Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, and won only in Telangana.
More happened at the Mumbai meet. Sources say the RJD leaders told Banerjee and Congress leaders that raids against the Lalu Yadav family had increased and this was strange. The RJD representative questioned how this could happen when Kumar was the CM and if he silently encouraged it.
It is with this level of mistrust that many like TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal and Congress’s Jairam Ramesh felt that it was perhaps better to not give clarity on the convener. Instead, this issue should be addressed only after seat-sharing talks are finalised.
But nothing moved ahead. The setback to the INDIA front and its worst fears have come true. Today, it is an uneasy picture for the front and its leaders. Not many know where they can pick up the threads from.
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