Seemanchal is a subregion of the Mithila region in the Northeastern part of Bihar includes seven districts scilicet Araria, Madhepura, Saharsa, Supaul, Purnea, Kishanganj and Katihar.
Out of these seven districts, Kishanganj is the only Muslim – Majority district of Bihar with Muslims forming around 70 Percent of the population. The recent Bihar Assembly election opened a wide door for AIMIM in Bihar, explicitly in the Seemanchal region, where the party democratically managed to grapple five seats. Before this, AIMIM conquered Political victory in a by-election in 2019 from the Kishanganj Assembly seat, unfortunately, they lost this seat to Izharul Hussain (INC) in the recent Bihar Assembly Election.
Kishanganj district holds four state assembly seats and in the thick of these seats, two are into a bucket of AIMIM. Two seats from Purnea district and one from Araria, summing up to five seats. In Kishanganj, the party defeated Workaholic JDU MLA Master Mujahid of Kochadhaman (served 7 Years) and quiescent INC MLA Md Tauseef Alam (served for 17 Years) of Bahadurganj.
Historically Kishanganj district had been witnessing election victory in parallel to identity politics. If a Muslim comes from any party, he wins. If the myriad of Muslims come, then the winning bucket goes to Congress/RJD except for the General Election of 1999, where Syed Shahnawaz Hussain (BJP) won by 8648 Votes by defeating Seemanchal Gandhi Mohammad Taslimuddin (RJD).
But the arrival of Asaduddin Owaisi in Kishanganj made the political wind veered from each and every political party to come about enticement towards AIMIM only. Systematically, Owaisi played the role of well-decorated ‘Muslim Messiah’, albeit an opportunist very unobtrusively. No member of Parliament or Legislative Assembly had ever raised issues of Kishanganj which refrained Cherrapunji of Bihar (Kishanganj) from development.
Asaduddin Owaisi gave a raging start in Parliament. He raised the issue of yearly flood which used to devastate almost the whole Seemanchal belt in its totality. The flood results in the complete devastation of agricultural field and the breeding of diseases as floodwater get into people’s abode. Thousands of people used to lose their life in a different way.
The timing of CAA in the last of 2019 was imperfectly perfect for him to entice the attention of Muslims, Particularly of the Seemanchal region. The way he tore up the copy of the CAA bill in Parliament acted as a catalyst to make him the tallest voice of the voiceless Indian Muslims. He succeeded in his plans. He made boundless promises. Since the Seemanchal belt is Muslim dominated, so very methodically he played the game of ‘Language Politics’.
His enthralling Urdu with the infusion of ‘Political Sher’, his costume – Sherwani with Musalmaani Topi and the reference of God in betwixt of his speeches exaggeratedly made him the tallest Muslim figure in the orb of contemporary Politics. I remember when Asaduddin Owaisi first came to Kishanganj (first in Bihar also) sometimes in 2015, he delivered a sher before his speech in Famous Ruidhasa Maidan:
“Khamosh majazi zindagi tumhe jeene nahi degi,
Agar jeena hai to kohram machana hoga”.
This outrightly divulges his political thought. Later in the same year October 2015 a case registered against his brother Akbaruddin Owaisi for allegedly making an inflammatory speech at an election rally in Kochadhaman, Kishanganj. All these melodramatic shades of Asaduddin Owaisi changed the perception of Muslims of the Seemanchal belt, pushing into the indentation of Communalism by blocking Muslim’s mind to introspect resulted in the victory of five seats, making him the ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star of Bihar Politics’.
Election Finished. Result declared. And silence subjugated in all five seats where AIMIM conquered Victory. In the manifesto of AIMIM, they started to do a pre-flood survey. Rain has entered Seemanchal but no such survey by their MLAs. They made a promise of organising ‘Janta Darbar’ to resolve people’s issue in their respective Assembly segment but after seven months of election result declaration, no such steps have been taken so far.
The relock down of Bihar accelerated the unemployment rate and made it stand much higher than the national average. So, in such a challenging time, the party has many capacities to hold free food camp but no signal of good work so far. This pandemic made everyone realised the value of Oxygen. In such a crisis, when people of the Muslim Seemanchal belt were crying for Oxygen and medicine, no AIMIM MLA came forward to help but Master Mujahid Alam, the Ex-MLA JDU came and resolved each and every issue without taking into account the question of whether they are his voters or not.
The Ex-MLA Master Mujahid started an initiative of helping financially also. He announced that the needy people can contact him anytime from anywhere. He also helped many people of the Seemanchal belt who are living outside of the state viz Delhi, Punjab, Mumbai etc. On the 28th of May, all five AIMIM candidates only managed to send three oxygen cylinders to Sadar Hospital and successfully managed two unequipped Ambulance. When an Ex- MLA was having a hectic schedule, seating AIMIM MLAs were indulging in the ‘Hide and Seek’ game and were rushing here and there to not take the responsibility.
Asaduddin Owaisi made a promise of implementing Article 371 in the Seemanchal region when the by-election was conducted 18 months ago. All his words seem to be bogus practically. During the assembly election campaign of 2020, he vowed to construct Owaisi hospital in those assembly segment from where his party will win.
Seven months till now, talk of these hospitals is like living on Mars, his party people didn’t provide even a single free medicine to anyone. AIMIM MLAs could manage to organise a camp where COVID related test and vaccination process may accelerate positively. In doing so, the AIMIM MLAs of Seemanchal betrayed the voters and manifested themselves for what motif they cherished the Assembly Seat. By voting for MIM has changed the developmental goal to MEME. AIMIM is a threat to development in conjunction with the social harmony of Kishanganj.