Janata Samajwadi Party (JSP) leader Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav has been elected vice-president on Friday.
The 52-year-old who was elected to the House of Representatives (HoR) from Bara-2 has become the third vice-president of Nepal.
He had started his professional career as a teacher in 1991 and was affiliated with Nepal Sadbhawana Party. He was also affiliated in 2002 with the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum, Nepal—which was essentially a non-governmental organization founded by Upendra Yadav and not a political party. He became central member and Bara head of Forum the next year while continuing his affiliation with Sadbhawana as people active with other parties could also join Forum.
He had participated in the Jana Andolan II of 2006 while working as teacher and then quit Nepal Sadbhawana Party after the Jana Andolan II. He taught at the Padam Devi Kanya Madhyamik Vidyalaya in Kalaiya, Bara for 17 years before starting active politics with Forum in March 2008.
He was elected to the First Constituent Assembly in 2008 through the Proportional Representation (PR) electoral system. He was also in the PR list in the Second CA Election held in 2013, but was not made lawmaker by the party that had suffered multiple splits by then and seen a massive drop in PR votes.
Upendra Yadav had urged him to remain in the PR list even in the general election in 2017 but he refused and was elected from Bara-2 through the First-Past-the-Post (FPTP) electoral system.
He is a very simple person, and comes from a family with humble financial background. Many were worried how he would manage election expenses while contesting the election in 2017. “Party Chairman Yadav had assured me that he would pick me as a lawmaker even if the party were to get only one seat through the PR electoral system,” he tells Setopati. “I was even asked to contest the provincial election with promise to make me chief minister. Chairman said he would support me no matter which constituency I would choose after I insisted that I would contest for federal lawmaker.”
He was again elected from the same constituency in the recent general election.
Yadav, who became forest minister for nine months after the election in 2017, is considered to be a leader with a clean image and impeccable integrity in the party.
He still stays in the same modest rented apartment in Shankhamul, Kathmandu where he had stayed after being elected CA member in 2008. His bedroom does not even have a bed and he sleeps on the floor in a room in the rented apartment.
“The rent was Rs 7,000 (per month) then,” he quips. “It has now risen to Rs 22,000.”
He does not own a private vehicle and reaches the Parliament Building in New Baneshwore and the party office at Bal Kumari by foot. His wife Champa Devi Yadav still lives in Kalaiya while his two sons and a daughter live in Kathmandu.
“My wife likes to rear cows-buffaloes,” he reveals. “I also went to rear cattle with her after the First CA was dissolved. We come from a farmer family and it is difficult to quit farming. We currently have only one cow as we are trying to build a small home.”
He is a confidant of Upendra Yadav and has never left the party chief since joining Forum in 2002 despite multiple splits in the party. He is among just four of the 25 listed central members while registering Forum as a political party with the Election Commission before the First CA Election. (Chairman Upendra Yadav, Mohammad Ishtiyaq Rai and Ram Bilas Yadav are the other three.)
He was made general secretary of the party by Upendra Yadav in 2009 and remained in the post for 12 years despite the party changing its name multiple times following a series of splits and unifications.
He has been an executive member since the party formed after unification of the then Federal Socialist Forum Nepal and Rastriya Janata Party decided to keep only two chairmen as office-bearers.
Rai, one of the only four Forum central members currently in JSP, calls Yadav a modest leader of Nepali politics and jokes that he and other leaders call him a ‘cow-leader’ as he is as gentle as a cow.
“Everyone recognizes him as a leader with clean and modest image. He is a leader who never goes beyond the party and party’s thinking. He remained in the party through a series of highs and lows for the party,” Rai effuses. “Such persons don’t join politics and would not last even if they join. They don’t become successful even if they last. But he has broken all those assumptions. The party has recognized his simplicity, integrity and working style. This has raised enthusiasm in the party cadres. Sent a message that even a simple leader would be recognized in politics.”
Ram Kumar Sharma, who was also close to Upendra Yadav in the past, but is now with CPN (Maoist Center), has a slightly different take on his election as vice-president and points that he has been made so for a purpose. Sharma accepts that Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav is a very simple leader who would not harm anyone and deserves to become vice-president but accuses that he has been made vice-president to serve Upendra Yadav’s interest.
He claims that Upendra Yadav, who lost to Janamat Party Chairman CK Raut in the House of Representatives (HoR) constituency of Saptari-2, wants to contest the by-election from Bara-2 that will be vacant after Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav assumes office as vice-president.
JSP leader Pradip Yadav, however, refutes the allegations.
Sharma contends that Upendra Yadav picked Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav as the parliamentary party leader despite interest by Federal Council Chairman Ashok Rai as Upendra Yadav wanted to become parliamentary leader after winning the by-election as Rai would not have readily agreed to step down.
JP Gupta, who was one of the founding leaders of Madhesi Janadhikar Forum, goes further than Sharma and refuses to even call Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav an honest leader. “A man with conscience would speak against wrongs even if that is not to the liking of anyone. He never spoke against Upendra Yadav’s wishes. He is a yes-man of Upendra Yadav. He has got this opportunity as he fulfills Upendra Yadav’s wishes without ever questioning Upendra Yadav,” Gupta stresses.
“There was no reason to send a directly elected lawmaker there. Upendra Yadav saw a safe seat in Bara-2 to go to the House. Upendra Yadav has, therefore, sent him there to fulfill his wishes.”
