RANCHI: Having come to power defying the unwritten rule of the “only tribal chief minister”, the newly appointed Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das is walking a tightrope, making all the right noises on tribal issues and sounding magnanimous bringing everyone along, including Shibu Soren, Babulal Marandi and Arjun Munda.
With just six days in office, he has extended the olive branch to the JMM, calling on its chief Soren. Das sought his blessings by touching his feet and called himself like his son in a move to placate the tribal bogey which was upset with the first non-tribal CM in the state. Das had been Soren’s deputy when Guruji, as Soren is fondly called, was the chief minister for a brief tenure in 2009.
Safeguarding the tribal interest has been the major poll plank for the JMM in view of the BJP’s ambivalent stand on the ethnicity of the CM during the assembly poll. It paid the divided for the JMM which bagged 19 seats, one more than its 2009 tally and mostly in tribal pockets.
He has reiterated that there will be no change in the Chotanagpur and Santhal Pargana Tenancy acts. “My only agenda is development,” he said, at a press meet in Jamshedpur.
Yet another strategy the BJP is working on is to woo estranged BJP leader Babulal Marandi to merge his outfit Jharkhand Vikas Morcha into the party. Though the BJP along with AJSU’s five MLAs has crossed the half-way mark of 41 in the 81-member House, the reunion with the JVM, having eight MLAs, will end the saffron brigade’s dependency on the AJSU to run the government smoothly. Das also called upon former CM Marandi and acknowledged his strength, saying the latter’s experience in running the government will guide him in his new role.
The BJP has also chosen tribal MLA Dinesh Oraon to be the first tribal speaker of the state. To keep his arch rival Arjun Munda in good humour, Das rushed all the way to Kharsawan on January 1 to offer tributes to tribal martyrs who had been killed in police firing on January 1, 1948. Later, he also announced to expedite the ongoing development projects in Kharsawan, the seat lost by Munda in this election. A large number of tribals had been killed protesting merger of princely states of Kharsawan and Saraikela with Odisha on January 1, 1948.
Das, the five-term MLA from Jamshedpur (East), has sent a strong message to bureaucracy a la Modi that he meant business and will brook no bungling in transfer-posting, a normal practice during the Hemant Soren government, making it clear that officers would don a position not for their closeness to any politician but for their work. He has also said that he doesn’t expect officers to drop in uninvited at his residence. The CM has asked the masses to immediately inform the Vigilance Bureau and his secretariat in case anyone tries to influence transfers and posting, tender contracts or awards by dropping big names. The complaint related to corruption should be dealt with utmost priority, he has stated.
Das has also got in touch with over a dozen IAS and IPS officers who are on central deputation in Delhi and were earlier reluctant to join the state administration on one ground or the other. On December 31, Das told journalists that his government would work 24x7 for speedy development and that the government would prepare a blueprint with the contribution of one and all. “There should be complete change in work culture,” he stated.
He has swiftly moved to give his thrust on industrialisation as engine of growth, telling his officials to find land for an integrated manufacturing cluster that would be part of the Centre’s proposed eastern dedicated freight corridor—Amritsar-Delhi-Kolkata. He has also issued directives to give a fresh look to the Industrial Policy, making it investor-friendly. “Economic development has to be given priority for the overall development of the state. Fast economic development can be ensured only by promoting industry and investment,” he said last week. And he meant it. Within two days of taking command of the off-track state, he gave approval to the long-pending lease renewal of Noamundi iron ore mines for Tata Steel. It had been pending since January 1, 2012.