BJP, JD(U) Celebrate Ashoka’s Birthday on Different Days Eyeing OBC Votes

Patna: Eyeing the Other Backward Class (OBC) votes in Bihar, both the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and ruling ally the Janata Dal (United)—the key constituents of the ruling National Democratic Alliance—have misappropriated Ashoka the Great’s history by claiming his birthday and caste.

Despite no reference to the Mauryan king’s date of birth and caste in ancient texts, the BJP and the JD(U) differ on his birthday and have declared him to have belonged to the Kushwaha or Koeri caste, a powerful OBC community.

The BJP celebrated Ashoka’s ‘2327th birth anniversary’ at the Convention Centre of Gyan Bhawan here on a big scale on Friday to woo the Kushwahas by projecting him as the pride and icon of the caste.

Several senior state BJP leaders, including state Panchayati Raj minister Samrat Choudhary, and Bihar-in-charge and Union labour minister Bhupender Yadav, minister of state for home affairs Nityanand Rai and Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister (CM) Keshav Prasad Maurya attended the function.

Earlier, the BJP had flagged off chariots in 10 districts to make people aware of Ashoka’s message of undivided India. Choudhary, who had organised the function, announced that the day would be celebrated on a massive scale next year.

A day after the BJP function, the JD(U) celebrated Ashoka’s birthday on Saturday with CM Nitish Kumar targeting its ally without naming it for celebrating the emperor’s birthday on the wrong date. “We are celebrating Ashoka’s birthday today as it is his real birthdate. It is wrong to celebrate his birthday on any other date as he was born on Ashtami, the ninth day of Chaitra Navratri. Some history experts had informed us of his birthdate and we have been celebrating it on this day,” he told the media admitting that there is no historical record of Ashoka’s date of birth. Kumar announced that Ashoka’s birth anniversary would be celebrated as a state function from next year.

Regarding Ashoka’s caste, the BJP and JD(U) have been claiming since 2015 that he belonged to the Kushwaha or Koeri caste. A few years ago, a senior state BJP leader had tried his best to use Ashoka’s name to woo Kushwaha voters by celebrating his birth anniversary.

Incidentally, eminent historians, including Romila Thapar, late DN Jha and Nayanjot Lahiri, have time and again clarified that there is no reference to Ashoka’s caste in ancient texts and it is wrong to assume his caste. Thapar has described the effort to attach Ashoka to a particular caste as baseless. She reportedly said that there is no mention of his date or year of birth in the Ashokan epigraphs, which are the only written version of events in his lifetime.

According to political watchers, the BJP is eyeing to make a dent in Kumar’s traditional social support base among the Luv-Kush (Kurmi-Koeri). After the BJP emerged as the big brother in the NDA in Bihar, Kumar was forced to play second fiddle.

Now, Kumar and his party have been trying to ensure that the support base is intact. Kumar, who is sure about the support of his own caste Kurmi, is worried about the BJP’s bid to gain the support of Koeris. The Koeri community is the largest social group after Lalu Prasad Yadav’s caste (Yadavs) in OBC in Bihar. In the caste-ridden politics of Bihar, the support of the Koeris is crucial for every party during elections.

Both the BJP and the JD(U) are playing politics to woo the Koeri community. It was reflected in mid-January when a war of words broke between the allies over Ashoka with the JD(U) accusing a BJP leader of portraying the emperor in a “poor light” and demanding action against him.

The row gathered steam after Padma Shri awardee and Sahitya Akademi Award-winning writer Daya Prakash Sinha, who is also the BJP’s cultural cell convener, in an interview compared Ashoka with Aurangzeb suggesting that both were “cruel” as rulers and had committed “sins”.

Taking serious objection to Sinha’s comment, JD(U) national president Lalan Singh demanded that the Padma Shri be taken back from Sinha. Former Union minister Upendra Kushwaha, who is chairman of the JD(U)’s parliamentary board, has also demanded the withdrawal of awards from Sinha. Later, the BJP downplayed the issue, which ended the controversy.