he Jharkhand protests against irregularities in state competitive exams present what seems to be an irony. While the protests are against the Hemant Soren-led Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) government in the state, protesters have been spotted with placards of the Chief Minister’s late father Shibu Soren, apart from those of Bhagat Singh and B R Ambedkar.
There have been several precedents of protests not posing questions against the core ideology of a party in power, but accusing its leadership of having fallen from the purported ideals of the party. This template does not just address the opponents of the ruling party but also seeks to address its old-timers by making the point that its past was better than the present.
Shibu Soren who was the leader of the JMM and one of its co-founders was a pivotal figure of the movement for the tribal state of Jharkhand from the 1980s. The demand was finally fulfilled in 2000, when the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government carved out Jharkhand from Bihar. Since then, Shibu Soren, who himself faced corruption allegations in his time, has held an iconic status in the state,
