To be good, Nitish Kumar needs to outdo himself

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has taken over the reins of the state government for the fourth time, but this is the first occasion when he has done so “under duress”.

His comeback before the next Assembly elections was definitely not part of the script that he had written while abdicating his chair nine months ago. The JD(U) strongman, as everybody knows, had relinquished his post after owning moral responsibility for his party’s crushing defeat in the Lok Sabha elections last year.

He had handed over the baton of good governance to an "unassuming" Mahadalit leader Jitan Ram Manjhi, hoping that he would carry forward his agenda until the state polls. But he had to reconsider his decision midway when Manjhi started following his own roadmap. Nitish has his task clearly cut out in his new innings, though. His biggest challenge is that he has to compete against himself now.

During his previous, uninterrupted tenure of eight-and-a-half years, he had raised the bar of good governance in Bihar. In a state known over the decades for political myopia and administrative sloth, he made development a buzzword with several out-of-the-box initiatives. The double-digit growth rate achieved during his tenure and steep jump in the per capita income earned him the moniker of "development man".

Against this backdrop, the people will naturally expect him to accelerate the growth engine in his fresh term. Nitish’s foremost focus now should be on bringing Bihar back on the rails of good governance. During Manjhi’s reign, the bureaucrats had turned complacent, taking him to be a stopgap arrangement. This had adverse impact on the overall governance in general.

Besides, the chief minister has to complete his unfinished agenda, the most notable being the improvement in the power scenario. Three years ago, he had vowed that he would not go out to seek votes in the next Assembly elections if he was not able to improve the electricity scenario. His next few months will definitely be spent on efforts to make the energy scenario look up in the state. On the political front, with the emergence of the BJP as a stronger opposition in the state, he has to keep his flock united ahead of the next Assembly elections.

Last but not the least, Nitish has to ensure that his alliance with Lalu Prasad does not take the sheen off his good governance agenda. The 15-year-long Rashtriya Janata Dal regime had earned notoriety for rampant lawlessness across the state. The new chief minister, therefore, has to ensure that his avowed agenda does not get diluted under the compulsions of coalition politics.

Nitish does not have much time left to do all that, though. He hardly has six-seven months to implement his decisions before the next polls. But if he is able to demonstrate by then that he has not lost his drive for good governance, he will certainly do himself a world of good in the all-important election year.