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With Nitish Kumar's son, Nishant, springing a surprise by canvassing for his father, talk is whether he is the next son to throw his ring in the political arena ahead of the Assembly polls in Bihar this year.
The Bihar Chief Minister, who claims that he is a true disciple of the late Karpuri Thakur, has been a staunch critic of dynastic politics. But rumours are that many of Nitish's allies would like Nishant to be made his political ‘heir', for the sake of continuity. For his part, Nishant has, so far, maintained a low profile and appeared to have evinced no interest in things political. The next few months will reveal the younger Kumar's plans.
Nonetheless, in the Indian political context, from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, the rise of sons—and daughters—is nothing extraordinary. Everybody who is anybody in politics has promoted their children at some point.
The Congress has its first family. While loyalists think it's an asset, the detractors see it as a liability. While the former say that the family has kept the party united, others insist that it has made the organisation a status quo-ist grouping that lacks fresh blood and spirit.
Families In The South
In the south, barring perhaps Kerala, most states have seen families shaping their political landscape. In Tamil Nadu, Udhaynaidhi Stalin is expected to carry forward the legacy of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and DMK supremo MK Stalin, who himself is the son of the late M. Karunanidhi. Nara Lokesh is a rising star in Andhra Pradesh, where his father and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu is the Chief Minister. Interestingly also, the opposition leader in the state, Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, who lost power last year, is the son of the late Y.S. Rajsekhar Reddy, who had been at the helm for two terms in the state. In Karnataka, Janata Dal (Secular) (JD-S) supremo HD Deve Gowda's son, HD Kumaraswamy, the current Union minister and former Karnataka chief minister, is leading the party. In neighbouring Telangana, K. Chandrasekhar Rao was attempting a hat-trick as the Chief Minister but lost badly for what the opposition dubbed his ‘dynastic rule'. His son, son-in-law, and daughter were influential figures in his regime.
Abdullahs In J&K, Yadavs In UP
In faraway Jammu and Kashmir, National Conference supremo Farooq Abdullah facilitated the swearing-in of his 54-year-old son Omar Abdullah, the first Chief Minister to take the reins in the state since the scrapping of Article 370 in 2019. This is Omar's second term; the first was when Jammu & Kashmir used to be a state.
In the Hindi-speaking belt, there is Akhilesh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh, Tejashwi Yadav in Bihar, Hemant Soren in Jharkhand, and Vasundhara Raje in Rajasthan—all products of dynasty and family. In poll-bound Bihar, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) patriarch Lalu Prasad Yadav has already declared his son Tejaswi as his political successor; his other son, Tej Pratap, and daughter, Misa, are also ambitious and active in politics.
Family Feuds In Maharashtra
Towards the West, in Maharashtra, problems in Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) arose when he started promoting his daughter, Supriya Sule, and ignoring his nephew, Ajit Pawar. Similarly, the split in Shiv Sena was also, to an extent, due to Uddhav Thackeray endorsing his son Aditya and sidelining Eknath Shinde. Notably, Shinde's son, Shrikant, who is an MP from his home turf of Thane district, is also a man with influence in the party. Over a decade ago, Raj Thackeray had parted ways with Sena because his uncle and Shiv Sena patriarch Bal Thackeray chose his son, Uddhav, as his heir, ignoring the firebrand nephew.
On the other end of the state's political spectrum, Devendra Fadnavis, who led the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state to a record win in Maharashtra in the recent assembly polls, is also somewhat a product of dynasty. His father, the late Gangadhar, was an MLC from Nagpur decades ago. Several other ministers in his government have risen owing to their families, including Nitesh Rane, Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, and a host of others.
Legacy Questions In Bengal And Odisha
Meanwhile, in West Bengal, Trinamool Congress boss and chief minister Mamata Banerjee, who demolished the Left Front rule in the state, seems to be in a dilemma about who her political successor should be. Her nephew and MP Abhishek Banerjee was briefly given the role, but there have been reports about differences between them. In neighbouring Odisha too, Biju Janata Dal (BJD) chief Naveen Patnaik, who had been at the helm for over two decades without a break, has not succeeded so far in finding an heir.
Dynasty continues to influence India's politics heavily. Is it something to do with culture? “If a doctor's son becomes a doctor and a lawyer's son follows him, what is wrong if the politician's son becomes a politician too?” is a common refrain, however flawed it may be. Perhaps one should not expect things to change too much in the near future.
(Sunil Gatade is a former associate editor with PTI. Venkatesh Kesari was an assistant editor with The Asian Age.)