<p>Cooch Behar (West Bengal): The presence of two friends-turned-foes, who have shaped the electoral politics of West Bengal’s largest Dalit group, at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Cooch Behar rally earlier this month has created ripples in North Bengal.</p>.<p>It is important to look back to understand the context of Rajbanshi leaders Anant Maharaj and Bangshi Badan Barman’s “reunion” after a long estrangement, and its implications for the region’s 50-odd seats.</p>.<p>The unmistakable European Renaissance-style architecture in the middle of an otherwise sleepy North Bengal town is visible from a distance. The Cooch Behar Palace, or Rajbari, spread over 50,000 square feet, was built by the Koch dynasty, which once ruled a vast stretch from Northeast Bihar to Assam.</p>.<p>Maharani Gayatri Devi, a staunch critic of former prime minister Indira Gandhi, was born and brought up in this palace before marrying into the Jaipur royal family. That’s the closest anyone in the Koch dynasty has ventured into politics after Independence.</p>.<p>The kings and queens are long gone. In democratic India, a social group that traces its lineage to the Koch royalty and constitutes the largest Scheduled Caste bloc in West Bengal now shapes the region’s trajectory of power politics.</p>.<p>The Rajbanshis of North Bengal crystallised into one homogenous caste group over more than a century. This consolidation was initiated by reformers seeking upward social mobility after the British introduced caste enumeration in the 1881 Census. In West Bengal, Rajbanshis were eventually deemed a Scheduled Caste.</p>.<p>They account for nearly 18% of the state’s electorate. Unlike the other dominant Dalit group, the Nama Sudras or Matua Hindus, many of whom migrated from Bangladesh, the Rajbanshis are concentrated in North Bengal. In Cooch Behar, they constitute about one-third of the electorate, while Nama Sudras make up close to 20%.</p>.<p>The Left Front in the 1960s was quick to decipher the demography of the region. The CPM’s ally, the Forward Bloc, won the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat 11 times between 1967 and 2014. Its local strongman, Amar Roy Pradhan, was a Rajbanshi.</p>.<p>The Trinamool Congress breached this seemingly impregnable red fortress in 2014. A key figure in that shift was Bangshi Badan Barman, a leader of the Greater Cooch Behar People’s Association, which had demanded a separate Kamatapur state for North Bengal. Incarcerated in 2005, he was released by the Mamata Banerjee government in 2011 and later appointed chairman of the Rajbanshi Development and Cultural Board and the Rajbanshi Bhasha Academy.</p>.<p>Meanwhile, Nagendra Roy, better known as Anant Maharaj, once a close aide of Barman and a fellow campaigner in the statehood movement, drifted away after Barman’s arrest in 2005. He moved closer to the BJP and eventually secured a Rajya Sabha berth.</p>.<p>In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won the Cooch Behar seat for the first time. Two years later, in the Assembly elections, the party swept seven of the nine seats in the district.</p>.<p>With the sounding of the election bugle last month, the two influential Rajbanshi leaders seem to have opted for a role reversal. Of late, Maharaj has been seen inching closer to the Trinamool. He was recently conferred the Banga Bhushan award by Mamata, and one of his close aides is now a TMC candidate from an Assembly segment in Cooch Behar.</p>.<p>Barman, on the other hand, is now aligned with the BJP, with two of his nominees featuring in the party’s candidate list for the West Bengal polls. </p>.<p>“Bangshi Badan is with us. He is going out to campaign with me today,” said Sukumar Roy, the BJP candidate from Cooch Behar Uttar.</p>.<p>And Anant Maharaj? “Well, he is our party MP. So, he is obviously with us,” he added.</p>.<p>Keeping up appearances, as they say, remains an elemental aspect of political conduct.</p>.<p>Highlights - Peek into the past The Rajbanshis of North Bengal crystallised into one homogenous caste group over more than a century It started after the British introduced caste enumeration in the 1881 Census Rajbanshis were deemed an SC, and now account for nearly 18% of the state’s electorate</p>
<p>Cooch Behar (West Bengal): The presence of two friends-turned-foes, who have shaped the electoral politics of West Bengal’s largest Dalit group, at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Cooch Behar rally earlier this month has created ripples in North Bengal.</p>.<p>It is important to look back to understand the context of Rajbanshi leaders Anant Maharaj and Bangshi Badan Barman’s “reunion” after a long estrangement, and its implications for the region’s 50-odd seats.</p>.<p>The unmistakable European Renaissance-style architecture in the middle of an otherwise sleepy North Bengal town is visible from a distance. The Cooch Behar Palace, or Rajbari, spread over 50,000 square feet, was built by the Koch dynasty, which once ruled a vast stretch from Northeast Bihar to Assam.</p>.<p>Maharani Gayatri Devi, a staunch critic of former prime minister Indira Gandhi, was born and brought up in this palace before marrying into the Jaipur royal family. That’s the closest anyone in the Koch dynasty has ventured into politics after Independence.</p>.<p>The kings and queens are long gone. In democratic India, a social group that traces its lineage to the Koch royalty and constitutes the largest Scheduled Caste bloc in West Bengal now shapes the region’s trajectory of power politics.</p>.<p>The Rajbanshis of North Bengal crystallised into one homogenous caste group over more than a century. This consolidation was initiated by reformers seeking upward social mobility after the British introduced caste enumeration in the 1881 Census. In West Bengal, Rajbanshis were eventually deemed a Scheduled Caste.</p>.<p>They account for nearly 18% of the state’s electorate. Unlike the other dominant Dalit group, the Nama Sudras or Matua Hindus, many of whom migrated from Bangladesh, the Rajbanshis are concentrated in North Bengal. In Cooch Behar, they constitute about one-third of the electorate, while Nama Sudras make up close to 20%.</p>.<p>The Left Front in the 1960s was quick to decipher the demography of the region. The CPM’s ally, the Forward Bloc, won the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat 11 times between 1967 and 2014. Its local strongman, Amar Roy Pradhan, was a Rajbanshi.</p>.<p>The Trinamool Congress breached this seemingly impregnable red fortress in 2014. A key figure in that shift was Bangshi Badan Barman, a leader of the Greater Cooch Behar People’s Association, which had demanded a separate Kamatapur state for North Bengal. Incarcerated in 2005, he was released by the Mamata Banerjee government in 2011 and later appointed chairman of the Rajbanshi Development and Cultural Board and the Rajbanshi Bhasha Academy.</p>.<p>Meanwhile, Nagendra Roy, better known as Anant Maharaj, once a close aide of Barman and a fellow campaigner in the statehood movement, drifted away after Barman’s arrest in 2005. He moved closer to the BJP and eventually secured a Rajya Sabha berth.</p>.<p>In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won the Cooch Behar seat for the first time. Two years later, in the Assembly elections, the party swept seven of the nine seats in the district.</p>.<p>With the sounding of the election bugle last month, the two influential Rajbanshi leaders seem to have opted for a role reversal. Of late, Maharaj has been seen inching closer to the Trinamool. He was recently conferred the Banga Bhushan award by Mamata, and one of his close aides is now a TMC candidate from an Assembly segment in Cooch Behar.</p>.<p>Barman, on the other hand, is now aligned with the BJP, with two of his nominees featuring in the party’s candidate list for the West Bengal polls. </p>.<p>“Bangshi Badan is with us. He is going out to campaign with me today,” said Sukumar Roy, the BJP candidate from Cooch Behar Uttar.</p>.<p>And Anant Maharaj? “Well, he is our party MP. So, he is obviously with us,” he added.</p>.<p>Keeping up appearances, as they say, remains an elemental aspect of political conduct.</p>.<p>Highlights - Peek into the past The Rajbanshis of North Bengal crystallised into one homogenous caste group over more than a century It started after the British introduced caste enumeration in the 1881 Census Rajbanshis were deemed an SC, and now account for nearly 18% of the state’s electorate</p>