The recently held assembly election went heavily in favor of the NDA, reducing the opposition strength to just 41 out of 243. The left parties also lost 13 seats and got only 3 seats. But these three represent the real voice of the oppressed and downtrodden and the fighting working masses of the state.

Among these three, the CPI(M) MLA elected from Bibhutipur (Samastipur) has made a mark as the most vocal opposition MLA articulating the sufferings of the common men and women and the issues of education, health, connecting dalits, villages with metalled roads and providing homestead lands to the homeless and against the bulldozer raj unleashed against the slum dwellers, roadside dwellers and even against those who are living for 40-50 years on government and ceiling surplus lands etc.

The recently concluded assembly budget session is particularly important for the role played by a true people’s representative who utilised every bit of the little time he was allotted and put the government in the dock on every issue he raised.

As a representative of Bibhutipur he raised several issues pertaining to stalled projects, bureaucratic delays and pervasive corruption leading to erosion of the quality of work. He raised pointed questions regarding the state of schools, colleges, lack of infrastructure, lack of teachers etc, in his constituency.

He also raised the issue of the deteriorating law and order situation and the daily incidents of mass rapes, murder of women and children, particularly of the vulnerable sections of society. The gruesome incident in the heart of Patna involving a girl preparing for the NEET exam has exposed the entire administrative machinery involved in covering up her murder. Though this incident made headlines, many such incidents are occurring in remote areas and are quickly forgotten. But Ajay Kumar in his two minutes of intervention on this issue made the Home Minister fumble for words. His standard reply was no culprit will be spared. But the police administration generally fail to apprehend the culprits on time and the sufferers are denied justice.

He raised the issue of the horrific incident in Harinagar village under Kusheshwarsthan in Darbhanga district. When a labourer belonging to a dalit caste demanded the payment of due wages, the Panchayat head and Sarpanch along with 300 high caste people armed with lethal weapons attacked the dalit dwelling, vandalising and looting the belongings of the poor labourers. Motor cycles were burnt and the men and women were mercilessly beaten up. A girl child, Komal, was severely injured and is now undergoing treatment in DMCH.

The CPI(M)’s intervention at the ground level and the issue raised in the assembly forced the government to take action against the culprits. But as they belong to high castes, the investigation is going on at a snail’s speed and many of the attackers are still roaming freely.

He further raised the issue of the plight of the weavers of the silk city of Bhagalpur. The entire silk industry, once a thriving industry, has been left to die a slow death. He demanded the construction of an apparel park, cheap electricity and supply of cotton and silk yarn to develop it as a textile hub.

The Bihar government is talking big about industrialisation of the state and inviting investors from the country and abroad, promising cheap land, electricity and other infrastructure, but to no avail. Bihar has the potential to develop textile clusters, agro-industries, fruit processing industries etc, which can provide employment to lakhs and lakhs of rural workers who migrate to far away places for meagre wages to run their households. The response from the industry minister was far from satisfactory. He only parroted the hollow assurances which have been repeated time and again. But the intervention of of the CPI(M) MLA who had visited Bhagalpur on January 19 on the occasion of martyr’s day, in the memory of three martyrs who had laid down their lives during the weavers movement in 1987, has galvanised the weavers of Bhagalpur to fight to save their home-based industry employing thousands of families and workers.

Com. Ajay Kumar demanded that the scheme workers, who have not been paid their  honorarium  for the last seven months, be paid immediately. He also brought to light the meagre wages paid to the hard-working men and women mid-day meal workers. They must be paid minimum wages for the entire 12 months of a year. They are paid only 10 months wages of 1600 per month. There are a large number of college teachers working in affiliated colleges all across Bihar who are not paid their salary and they depend on the meagre aid and whatever they get from the students attending these colleges.

Such issues remain buried in high sounding development phrases mouthed day in and day out by the honourable Chief Minister himself.

By raising all these issues. Com Ajay Kumar has single-handedly exposed the development trajectory that ignores the basic requirements of common people who invest their energy on a daily basis to eke out their lives.