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The ‘small government’, as JD(U) candidate Ananth Singh is known in the field, was running uninterrupted from 2005 until he was disqualified from 2022 due to his conviction in an Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act case.
In the upcoming by-election, his wife Neelam Devi retained the seat for the RJD, which had given her the ticket to her husband two years ago, although after his acquittal in the case by the Patna High Court, Singh decided he no longer needed a spouse to hold the fort.
‘Dada’, the nickname by which Suraj Bhan Singh is known, is, however, ineligible and hence, his wife Veena Devi, who is contesting on an RJD ticket, needs to stand in the assembly elections on his behalf.
Suraj Bhan Singh started his political career in 2000, when he contested as an independent candidate and wrested the Mokama seat from Anant’s late elder brother Dilip Singh, who was fondly called ‘Bade Sarkar’ by the locals, and who also became a minister in the government led by Rabri Devi, wife of RJD president Lalu Prasad.
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It is widely believed that Suraj Bhan Singh’s “dynamism” in helping Nitish Kumar form the government after a hung assembly in the assembly elections that year caught the eye of his mentor, the late Ram Vilas Paswan.
Four years later, he left the assembly seat and became MP from the now abolished Ballia seat, contesting the election on the ticket of Lok Janshakti Party founded by Paswan.
Ananth Singh decided that the time had come for him to make political moves and he contested the assembly elections in 2005, winning both times in February and October as a JD(U) candidate.
She is believed to have earned the trust of Nitish Kumar as a local strongman leader, while the JD(U) supremo represented the now-defunct Barh constituency in the Lok Sabha, of which Mokama was a part.
Tall, powerful and known to wear sunglasses even indoors, Ananth Singh wants to come back to challenge his old rival on his home turf.
Anant Singh said, “He (Suraj Bhan) has always been of a fickle nature. Look at his political career. He left Mokama to become MP from Ballia. His wife (in 2014) became MP from Munger and five years later his brother was elected from Nawada.”
Taking umbrage at the use of the word ‘Baahubali’, the ‘Chhote Sarkar’ alleged, “It is the media that invents such labels. I will win on the basis of people’s blessings and the good work done by Nitish Kumar.”
When reminded that he does not have good relations with the JDU supremo since he contested the elections as an independent in 2015, he said, “That is the past. But, you will agree that the people of Mokama vote for me, whether I am contesting as an independent or on any party ticket.”
However, ‘Dada’, who has been in the political wilderness for some time now as none of his family members are in Parliament or the state legislature, believes that people are going to vote for change, be it Mokama or the rest of Bihar.
His official candidate wife said, “Anant Singh does not know how to talk. How can he raise the issues of his constituency in the Assembly? On the other hand, I have the experience of Parliament, where I got the opportunity to raise issues related to the seven assembly constituencies that fall under my Lok Sabha constituency.” He also pointed to “visible deterioration in Mokama”, a part of Patna district located about 100 km from the state capital.
“I am the daughter of Begusarai but the daughter-in-law of Mokama. I am proud that Nazareth Hospital here once looked after a large part of Bihar. But, today, we have no facilities, not even proper roads,” the RJD candidate alleged.
Mokama constituency has always elected Bhumihar. But since 1990, when Dilip Singh decided that he had stopped providing “assistance” to better-placed politicians, and turned the tables on one of his beneficiaries, the seat became that of a ‘bahubali’.
The future of Mokama and the eight candidates contesting here will be decided by 2.84 lakh voters in the first phase of voting on November 6.