Hemant Soren
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A profile
Amitabh Srivastava
January 15, 2015
Emerging out of father Shibu Soren's shadow to take JMM's tally to its highest ever, the new leader of opposition has rewritten the script: in Jharkhand, you are either with Hemant or with the BJP
Arriving in a glistening grey bandhgala, Hemant Soren looks unusually at peace with himself for a man who has lost his job as chief minister of Jharkhand, and one of the two assembly seats he had contested. And lost them only last month. The 39-yearold Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader oozes contentment, as he walks briskly towards his chamber in the state Assembly.
Nominated the leader of opposition on January 8, Soren is flanked by leaders of all Opposition parties, including the Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (JVM), which is said to be hobnobbing with the ruling BJP. A handshake here, a quiet word there, and everyone seeking a private audience with him-it is evident Soren has emerged out of his father Shibu Soren's shadows.
If the Jharkhand assembly election results announced on December 23 carried another first, besides ensuring the young state got its first non-tribal chief minister in Raghubar Das, it is that only Soren's JMM is fighting in the ring with the BJP. The rest-from a much-reduced Congress and JVM to the cleaned-out Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Janata Dal (United)-are only spectators with a ringside view.
Having passed the moment of truth by stopping the BJP from getting a majority on its own, and taking JMM to an all-time high of 19 assembly seats against all predictions, this then, is the younger Soren's moment in the sun. The results have pitchforked him into being the tallest tribal leader in Jharkhand in an election that saw other community stalwarts, including three former CMs Arjun Munda, Babulal Marandi and Madhu Koda, bite the dust.
But it was not so sunny even a few weeks ago. Before the polls, even JMM leaders treated him with respect only because he was Shibu Soren's son and the de facto party chief. Everyone expected the BJP to sail through-at the expense of the JMM. Having won 12 of the 14 Lok Sabha seats in May 2014, and leading 56 of the state's 81 assembly segments, the BJP was riding on the coat-tails of PM Narendra Modi. Worse for JMM, the Opposition-unlike in the Lok Sabha polls-stood bitterly divided. In October, the Congress and RJD ended their 15-month alliance with JMM after seat-sharing talks broke down.
Worse still, at 71, party patriarch Shibu Soren looked no match for the Modi juggernaut ahead of the assembly polls. Though Soren senior was a CM for a total of only 306 days in three separate terms-against Hemant's 500-plus days in office-many vote for JMM only because they see in the father a venerable and indefatigable icon of tribal leadership. By the time Congress snapped ties, the Election Commission had already announced the election dates. The biggest worry for Soren, thus, was to prepare for seats he had never thought JMM would contest.
It would have been prudent to concentrate on only 45 seats where his party mattered, but Soren realised that as the CM he could not have left the remaining 36 constituencies uncontested. "The situation was akin to preparing food for 10 people and then having 30 guests for dinner," he chuckles, visibly happy at the analogy.
But Soren took the plunge and went after the BJP with everything in his arsenal. He selected new candidates, cut down on funds for the 45 already selected, and campaigned vigorously, addressing nearly 300 public meetings. It was a risk, one that would have obliterated him politically had he not delivered.
The results must have surprised him too: JMM raised its seats from 18 to 19 and vote share from 14.47 per cent to 20.4 per cent, and stopped the BJP at 37 seats-four short of the halfway mark.
Though Hemant owes his initial political fortunes to his birth certificate, his debut was a disaster. Shibu Soren's decision to field his younger son from the familiar turf of Dumka in 2005 left the party facing a rebellion. Shibu's long-term associate Stephen Marandi, then a Rajya Sabha MP, left JMM, contested Dumka as an Independent, and won. Hemant finished a poor third.
The tables turned four years later: Soren junior won and Marandi, a sixtime MLA from Dumka, finished third. But the strategist in Soren won back "Chacha (uncle) Stephen" in the autumn of 2014 after the Congress and RJD left him, along with old-timers such as Simon Marandi. With feelers hitting a wall, Soren worked the phone himself to reach out to the senior leader. Overwhelmed, Stephen rejected JVM's ticket from Dumka and accepted Soren's decision to field him from Maheshpur, a new constituency for him. Stephen won.
Soren also brought in Anil Murmu from JVM, who defeated JMM defector Simon Marandi. Another successful poach, Dasrath Gagrai from JVM, defeated former BJP CM Arjun Munda.
Another revelation of the longdrawn campaign phase was the emergence of a new mass leader in the Soren household. Never known as a leader of the people, he had little option but to win over new bases this time around, with Shibu Soren somewhat semi-retired and the BJP snapping at his heels even in JMM's strongholds. He seems to have succeeded in doing so.
Soren's suave profile also stands in sharp contrast to JMM's identity of agitation politics. Unlike his father, whose disinterest for files and policies is no secret, Soren has thrived as an administrator, which would certainly come handy even now, in Opposition. In fact, one of the reasons the BJP today seems desperate to ensure a merger of Babulal Marandi's eight-MLA party is because the saffron camp is worried about Soren's ability to wean away tribal MLAs of its alliance partner AJSU, which has five legislators in the assembly.
The BJP's apprehensions are not without reason. Known as a fiercely independent man who does not forget his enemies, Soren had pulled down the Munda government in which he himself was the deputy CM. It was seen largely as Soren's reply to the BJP, which had pulled down his father's fivemonth-old government in May 2010.
Will there be a repeat? Hemant Soren is now too seasoned a politician to out his aces. What goes up must come down, he says, reminding BJP of the challenges he will pose. For Raghubar Das, heading Jharkhand's 10th government in 15 years, those challenges can come sooner than later.
As in 2019 Nov
Hemant Soren is the working president of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and is the son of former Union minister and tribal leader Shibu Soren. He was the chief ministerial face of the JMM-Cong-RJD opposition alliance in the 2019 Jharkhand assembly polls. Going by the current trends, Soren could well assume the top post in the state again with his JMM-led alliance crossing the majority mark.
Here's a brief political journey of Hemant Soren:
- Hemant was born on August 10, 1975 to Shibu Soren and Roopi at Nemra village in Ramgarh district. While his close aides claim he has completed mechanical engineering, Hemant submitted his educational qualification as intermediate pass when he filed nomination papers for both the 2005 and 2009 assembly polls.
- He made his debut in electoral politics in the 2005 assembly polls when he contested from Dumka. His political foray turned out to be a flop show as he was defeated by party rebel Stephen Marandi.
- Hemant was pushed into the senior JMM leadership in 2009 after the sudden death of his elder brother Durga. It was Durga who was considered the natural successor to Shibu Soren but his death pushed Hemant to the centre stage of state politics.
- Hemant had a brief stint as Rajya Sabha MP, serving from June 24, 2009 to January 4, 2010.
- In September, Hemant became the deputy chief minister of Jharkhand when Arjun Munda headed a coalition of the BJP/JMM/JDU/Ajsu party.
- He became the state's youngest chief minister in 2013 and served till December 2014.
- In January, Hemant led the talks with opposition parties - Congress, JVM-P and RJD - as Jharkhand became the first state where plans of a mahagathbandhan materialised.
- During the campaigning, he led protests against the proposed amendments to the pro-tribal tenancy laws, extended support to 70,000-odd temporary teachers for regularisation, criticised the Raghubar Das-led state government for taking over retail liquor sales, and opposed the merger of government schools.
2022: Difficult times
February 1, 2024: The Times of India
Jharkhand Chief Minister Champai Soren on Sunday accused the BJP of framing his predecessor Hemant Soren in false cases to continue the loot of minerals from the state. Addressing a party workers' rally on the occasion of the 52nd foundation day of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) at the Golf Ground in Dhanbad, Champai Soren also alleged that the BJP and outsiders were engaged in looting minerals of the state for 19 years in the state."When Hemant Soren came to power (in 2019) and stopped them from doing so, they framed him in false cases," the CM claimed.Senior JMM leader Champai Soren became the chief minister on February 2, two days after Hemant Soren's resignation as the CM on January 31 following a marathon interrogation by the ED in a money laundering case linked to an alleged land fraud, and his subsequent arrest."Hemant Soren had initiated steps to ensure the rights of tribal through 1932 Khatiyan based domicile policy and 75 per cent job reservation for local youths in private companies. The BJP could not digest these and they used central agencies against him," he alleged.
