How Nitish Kumar’s Mahadalit experiment failed – both politically and for development

Churaman Nagar does not appear on a Google Maps search. Yet, residents of the village 10 kilometres east of the Gaya city in Bihar say that journalists and “NGO people” keep visiting them. The reason: for decades, the village that is home to nearly 300 families, mostly from the Dalit Musahar community, has been plagued with high fluoride content in the groundwater. This has caused a spate of physical deformities among the residents.

A week before Gaya was to go to the polls on April 19 in the first phase of the Lok Sabha elections, Churaman Nagar resident Barrister Manjhi, in his 40s, had only a wry smile to offer when asked if he would vote for Jitan Ram Manjhi, who is also a Musahar. Jitan Ram Manjhi has been nominated by the Bharatiya Janata Party’s ally Hindustani Awam Morcha.

But Barrister Manjhi had more serious concerns than trying to decide whether a candidate from his community would be the best choice as his Parliamentary representatives. He explained: “Nobody here lives beyond the age of 45-50.”

Musahars are among the 18 Scheduled Castes in Bihar recognised as Mahadalits in 2007 – a category introduced by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to identify the most backward Scheduled Castes. He...

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