Contesting Development: Understanding the Interface between Development Discourse and Subalterns Politics in Bihar

Abstract

Janata Dal (later on the Rashtriya Janata Dal) government under the leadership of Lalu Prasad Yadav in Bihar during its regime, attacked the hegemonic discourse of development by raising the slogan, ‘humein vikas nahin samman chahiye’ (we need dignity, not development). One should not treat this as merely slogan as the paper will show how anti-development politics has its own materiality, which can be found in concrete practices of the government. So the real issue is not whether anti-development politics is rhetorical or not but how to make sense of it. How can one imagine such a situation especially in the liberalization era, where there is tacit consensus over desirability of growth oriented development across all political spectrum and almost every state government is competing for getting maximum benefit form liberalized economy. This paper tries to contextualize these instances of complete rupture from development through the framework of post development discourses, where the issue of dignity and self-respect overshadows the desirability of development