Patna, March 23: JD(U) president Sharad Yadav has described the delimitation commission-executed “change in social equations” in the Banka Lok Sabha constituency as a reason for “denial” of ticket to former external affairs minister Digvijay Singh who had represented the seat twice.

Yadav’s explanation unveils JD(U)’s “real” leader and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s game plan to prefer candidates belonging to extremely backward castes (EBC) and maha-Dalits.

In fact, Nitish, right from the time of taking over the reign of the state in November 2005, has kept the EBC, maha-Dalits and Muslims in the “focus” of what he has described as the “all-inclusive growth”-oriented development. The basic motive behind Nitish’s jargon of “all-inclusive growth” is to organise the ubiquitous EBCs who constitute almost 36 per cent of the state’s population under his party’s control.

Nitish apparently calculated that if the EBCs were organised and if he succeeded in roping in a section of the “pasmada (backward class)” Muslims, he would be able to put up a strong contest against the M-Y (Muslim-Yadav) combination of Lalu Prasad, believed to constitute about 29 per cent of the state’s voters. But Lalu has brought Ram Vilas Paswan’s LJP, which is believed to have been enjoying the unstinted support of 4 per cent paswans in the state.

The JD(U) list is replete with maha-Dalit and EBCs, much than other parties. The EBCs and maha-Dalits in the list include Manganilal Mandal (Jhanjharpur), Baidnath Mahto (Balmiki Nagar), Jai Narayan Nishad (Muzaffarpur), Maheshwar Hajari (Samastipur), Damodar Rawat (Banka), Mahabali Singh (Karakat) and Bhudeo Choudhary (Jamui).

Nitish’s party has “united” as a suffix in Janata Dal. But Nitish has preferred to stick to the formula of his social engineering even at the cost of virtually making the word “united” irrelevant for the JD(U), which has seen a number of its leaders quitting in revolt.

Digvijay, a member of royal Rajput family, whose Banka seat has been allotted to Damodar Rawat, an EBC, has decided to contest as an Independent candidate on the same seat saying: “I have never believed in caste politics.”

Two Bihar ministers, Nitish Mishra and Nagmani, resigned from their posts. Nitish Mishra, a Brahmin and son of former chief minister Jagannath Mishra, has apparently resigned in anger at not being given the party ticket for contesting the Lok Sabha polls from Jhanjharput, his home seat.

But the fact remains that Nitish Kumar preferred an EBC, Manganilal Mandal from Jhanjharpur, and no Brahmin figures in the JD(U)’s list.

More than anyone else, Nitish Kumar had all along been stating that the “development of the state, better governance and improved law and order situation” would be the main plank of his party at the polls.