has been re-established that be ever so high; the law is above you,” says BJP leader Arun Jaitley. “It was all Lalu’s earning. Lalu has got what he had sown… how could he get flowers when he had sown a tree of thorns?” questioned former Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi, who was one of the original litigants against Lalu when the scam first broke in 1996.

For 15 long years between 1990 and 2005, Bihar had been his fiefdom. Lalu’s words were law and in August 1997 when he was first jailed in the case, so much was his clout in Bihar and national politics that he could name his semi-literate wife Rabri Devi as the Chief Minister before he walked gallantly behind bars.

Lalu stands disqualified from Lok Sabha: The Supreme Court, on July 10th this year, had declared ultra vires Section 8(4) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, which shielded ‘convicted parliamentarians/legislators from disqualification’, provided they appealed against their conviction in the higher court within 90 days of being sentenced. Thus, on October 22nd, 2013, the Lok Sabha secretariat announced disqualification of both convicted members Lalu Prasad (RJD) and Jagdish Sharma (JD-U) and rendered them ineligible to contest for 11 years. Rasheed Masood, Congress MP in Rajya Sabha is the first Indian parliamentarian to be found guilty in a criminal case after the Supreme Court had ruled that lawmakers stand immediately disqualified if they are convicted for offences that carry a sentence of more than two years. On 19th September 2013 Masood was convicted for cheating, criminal conspiracy and forgery in a medical admission scam during his tenure as Central minister of State for health when he had given the medical seats of Tripura to undeserving students.

The case, its progress over the years amid efforts to derail it definitely need a closer look as the very neta-babu raj (politician-bureaucrat nexus), the chief malady in Indian administration, stands exposed. Importantly both the netas and babus have been declared guilty for a change. It goes without saying that if the Indian governance story is a saga of failures and administrative lapses, the politician - bureaucrat unholy nexus remains a cancerous malady. One can safely remark that no serious attempt has been made over the years to stem the rot.

Instead, political observers were shell shocked when there was a peculiar situation when the Union Cabinet in Delhi led by Mr. Honest of Indian politics, Dr. Manmohan Singh tried to shield Lalu and other such offenders, especially a former Rajya Sabha Congress MP, Rashid Masood.

The Union Cabinet had recommended to President Pranab Mukherjee to sign an ordinance that would have “shielded” at least the membership of Lalu Prasad and Masood in the Parliament.

It is altogether a different chapter that, bowing under public pressure, the Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi snubbed the Prime Minister directly calling the ‘ordinance’ draft ‘non-sense’ even as by then the President and even the opposition BJP had made their intent clear against its passage.

Meanwhile, a curious nation saw Lalu Prasad walking into Ranchi’s famous Birsa Munda Central jail and everyone debated the priceless philosophical question – destiny cannot be postponed indefinitely. In the hard political reality the real issue in question was how the verdict could render a telling blow to his RJD party and bring about political changes in Bihar.

“As their supreme leader Lalu Prasad has gone behind bars, RJD is faced with a serious crisis. But the bigger question is whether a weakened Lalu means his vote bank - Muslims and Yadavs (MY) - would now shift either to Nitish Kumar or to the BJP,” says Delhi - based political commentator Himanshu Mishra.

Ironically for Lalu and his party men and women, the judgement came at a time when RJD was hoping to reap the dividends of JD (U)’s breakup with BJP and the anti - incumbency wave working against Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

Lalu’s words were law and in August 1997 when he was first jailed in the case, so much was his clout in Bihar and national politics that he could name his semi-literate wife Rabri Devi as the Chief Minister

The ironic element for Lalu Prasad is that even if he gets a relief in the Chaibasa treasury case in which he has been convicted; five more cases related to the Rs.950 crore fodder scam are in various stages of trial. Of these four are in Ranchi’s CBI court and the one in Patna.

“We will challenge the verdict,” says former RJD MP and a defence lawyer for Lalu, Rajniti Prasad adding “The verdict against Lalu and others by the CBI court was only part of a political conspiracy”. Lalu’s two sons and their mother Rabri Devi also said that they will challenge the verdict and expose the conspiracy.

But politically, RJD’s bigger setback was that even Rahul Gandhi is no longer keen to retain the ‘old ties’ with Lalu for the sake of sentiments.

RJD leaders like Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, a former union Rural Development Minister, told party confidants in Patna that even as Sonia Gandhi is against any move to dump Lalu completely, Rahul Gandhi is already making overtures to JD (U). “I know the Congress has also made a significant forward movement in cementing ties with Nitish Kumar’s JD (U),” he told Eastern Panorama.

But to argue politically that Nitish Kumar’s JD (U) will emerge as the chief gainer of Lalu’s jail yatra is a bit far - fetched. Another convict served with jail sentence Jagannath Mishra has his son Nitish Mishra in the Bihar cabinet. Thus, an argument is being made that it is BJP who has a real a win - win situation.

Therefore, BJP spokesman Syed Shahnawaz Hussain says that contrary to JD (U)’s enthusiasm in the entire complex situation, it is the BJP which is in a win - win position in Bihar. “We already have our traditional votes. The anti - incumbency votes against Nitish will shift to us as we are his natural opponents now. And a weakened RJD would drive substantial Yadavs and Muslims towards a winning party like BJP and our leader Narendra Modi,” he says.
 
In fact, the saffron party has been trying to win over the Yadavs and with that goal in mind has appointed Nand Kishore Yadav as the party’s floor leader in the assembly. In fact, in the 2010 assembly polls out of at least 18 seats where Yadavs are the dominant social group, BJP had picked up 4 Yadav stronghold seats.

At this point it is also worth discussing what Lalu has transform Bihar into.

In the 15 long years that he ruled, as the rest of India despite hurdles made progress, Bihar’s economy remained the same old primordial and development and modernity took a backseat. There was a chaotic law and order situation and in the words of Arun Jaitley of the BJP, “A new ideology was born which emphasized that growth and development do not get votes” … but caste does! And of course, ‘vulgarity’ became a political legion.

The State remained economically poor not because of a lack of resources but due to ignorance about the abundant resources available. As industries stayed away, native Biharis fled to Mumbai and other places including to communal - riot hit Gujarat either to get hatred (from likes of Raj Thackeray) or to sweat it out to build up ‘Narendra Modi’s home State.’ In the process, one-liners came in such as: “Making of Lalu Yadav and unmaking of Bihar.”

The writ of goondaism (hooliganism) replaced the writ of law and so the menace of kidnapping for ransom found its hitche. A glimpse of this can be enjoyed in the Bollywood film, “Apaharan” (the kidnap) by popular Bihari filmmaker Prakash Jha.

All in all, Lalu’s story is not an isolated case of corruption in the higher offices of the country. In desi parlance, one could better say, “Hamam mein sab nange haen” (everyone is naked in the bathroom).

Decades ago, in his serialized investigative stories on corruption involving the then Maharashtra Chief Minister A R Antulay, Arun Shourie wrote, “Look at these political rats; how they run.” The political class has not changed much since then. In the physical sense, the numbers of rats have only increased and probably the rats have fattened and have become more difficult to trap. In retrospect, the list of corruption episodes embroiling netas is endless. But rarely have the political masters been booked.
 
Under Dr. Manmohan Singh there have been half a dozen cases and top political leaders such as Suresh Kalmadi, Kanimozhi and A Raja have gone behind bars. Also recently a parliamentary probe panel adopted a controversial report giving a clean chit to Prime Minister Singh and Finance Minister P Chidambaram on the Rs.1.76 lakh crore 2G spectrum scam.

The tehelka tapes had caught up with noted socialist George Fernandes and his socialite friend Jaya Jaitley. While Bangaru Laxman and B S Yeddyurappa embarrass BJP, the late Rajiv Gandhi had lost power owing to the Bofors kickback scam. In later years, P V Narasimha Rao was charged with receiving a suitcase full of currency from stockbroker Harshad Mehta.

N. Vittal, the former Chief Vigilance Commissioner, once clubbed five types of people who practice and propagate corruption in India. Neta, the politician, babu (bureaucrat), lala (industrialists), dada (criminal) and jhola (NGOs). Something has stuck permanently and as journalist Shivesh Garg laments, if the ‘Radia tape’ was a case in point, the fourth estate and noted media personalities too have a share.

Swati Deb