With cine-star turned politician and BJP MP from Patna Sahib, Shatrughan Sinha, exploring options in Lalu Prasad Yadav’s RJD, leaders of the Kayastha community have started eyeing the constituency ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Bihar’s Patna Sahib constituency is dominated by voters belonging to Kayastha community. Shatrughan Sinha has been winning the seat for two consecutive terms ever since it was created after delimitation. Before delimitation, the Patna Lok Sabha constituency mostly remained with either the BJP or the RJD.
Sources said the way Sinha has been attacking his own party, the BJP leadership is unlikely to give him a ticket in 2019. The Bihari babu, they said, has held talks with Lalu and his son Tejashwi Yadav and it is believed that he may join the RJD.
“Since Kayastha voters play a decisive role in Patna Sahib, even Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, also from the same community, earlier wanted to contest from there. However, he was recently re-elected for the Rajya Sabha from Bihar. Following this, other Kayastha leaders have started nurturing the constituency,” said a source. According to estimates, there are more than 4 lakh Kayastha voters in Patna Sahib.
A Bihar BJP source said Kayasthas have traditionally been with the BJP and Shatrughan Sinha being from the community added to his electoral performance. However, now a majority of the voters of his constituency are not happy with the way he has been targeting the BJP leadership. “He is a rebel, who is not leaving the party on his own. If he contests elections from RJD, the Kayastha votes will not get transferred. Kayasthas are unlikely to vote for an RJD candidate,” he said.
With Ravi Shankar Prasad out of the race, other Kayastha leaders like Rituraj Sinha (BJP) and Ranbir Nandan (JDU) have emerged as the front-runners. Rituraj Sinha is the son of Rajya Sabha MP from BJP, R.K. Sinha. Rituraj is a secretary in the Bihar BJP. However, Rituraj is mostly known as a business professional who is looking after his father’s security company, Security and Intelligence Services (SIS). He is not much active politically.
However, the source said, Ranbir Nandan, a JDU MLC, is also eying the constituency. “Nandan has been with the BJP, ABVP in the past. However, he was not ‘rewarded’ in the BJP and Nitish Kumar took him to JDU and made him MLC. A former Patna University Students’ Union general secretary, Nandan has a good hold in the constituency and among the Kaysathas as well as other communities. Since JDU is now a part of the NDA, the party may ask for the Patna Sahib seat from the BJP,” said a source.
Nandan, interestingly, was the election in-charge of the constituency when Shatrughan Sinha won the seat for the first time in 2009. There are other leaders like Nitin Navin and Arun Sinha—MLAs from Bankipur and Kumharar Assembly constituencies, respectively, falling under Patna Sahib. However, according to sources, their influence is limited to their respective Assembly constituencies.
Shatrughan Sinha has been at odds with the BJP for a long time for being “sidelined”. He has been criticising his party on many issues, including demonetisation and GST. He even dared the party leadership to take action against him. Sources said he is hobnobbing with the RJD and may contest the next elections under it.