Shibu Soren

Shibu Soren (born January 11, 1944, near Ramgarh [now in Jharkhand], India) is an Indian politician and government official who was a cofounder and then longtime president of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM; Jharkhand Liberation Front). He also served three terms as the chief minister (head of government) of Jharkhand (2005; 2008–09; and 2009–10) state in northeastern India.

Early life and first political activity

Soren was born in a small village in what is now central Jharkhand state. He and his family were members of the Santhal ethnic group in eastern India (one of the peoples officially part of the classification Scheduled Tribes). His father was murdered while he was still a young student, and he left school to work as a wood trader.

Soren’s first political activity dates to the early 1970s, when he became involved with liberating tribal lands from outside interests. He soon was an influential tribal leader. His political activities, however, were alleged on several occasions to have included violence. In early 1974 Soren was said to have led a group that killed two people following a dispute over the slaughter of a goat for a feast, and he was reported to have been associated with a mob attack on a Muslim-dominated village in January 1975 that resulted in the deaths of several people. Murder charges were eventually filed against him and others in each case. In succeeding years Soren was implicated in other criminal activities, which complicated his political career and hampered his ability to hold important government positions.

The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) movement was formed in 1973 by Soren and others, with its main objective being the creation of a separate Jharkhand state out of the eastern and southern portions of the existing Bihar state. That goal was achieved in 2000. Soren successfully expanded the political base of the JMM by soliciting the support of industrial and mine workers and of the region’s minority peoples. He became the president of the JMM in 1987.

Career in elected office

Soren was active politically at both the national and state levels. He first ran for office as an independent in the 1977 elections to the Lok Sabha (lower chamber of the Indian parliament), losing in his bid for a seat from a Bihar constituency. Three years later, however, he was successful in the 1980 Lok Sabha polling, and he won reelection in 1989, 1991, 1996, and 2004—the latter instance from a constituency in Jharkhand. In addition, in 2002 he was elected to the Rajya Sabha (upper chamber of the parliament) from a Jharkhand constituency, a post that he resigned after his subsequent victory later in 2002 in a by-election for a seat in the Lok Sabha.

The creation of Jharkhand state in 2000 did not bring much political success for the JMM. In order to improve its prospects, the party had to forge alliances with either the Indian National Congress (Congress Party) or the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)—each being ideologically distinct from the other. In addition, as a result of Soren’s alleged involvement in criminal activities, both the party and Soren continued to be hampered in their attempts to gain political power.

In 2004 the JMM contested the Lok Sabha elections as part of the successful Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA), and in March Soren joined the UPA cabinet as the minister of coal and mines. Within two months, however, he was forced to resign after an arrest warrant was issued for him in a murder case tied to the 1975 attack on Muslims. Soren spent a month in judicial custody. In November 2004, after he had been released on bail, he was able to reclaim his cabinet post as part of an agreement between the Congress Party and the JMM to form an alliance for Jharkhand’s first state legislative assembly polls in 2005.

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That alliance—which also included the Rashtriya Janata Dal (National People’s Party)—was able to form a coalition government in the state, but Soren’s attempt to become the chief minister lasted for less than two weeks in March 2005 after he was unable to win a vote of confidence in the state assembly. In January 2006 Soren returned to the UPA cabinet, but he was again compelled to resign after his November 2006 guilty verdict in a third murder case (dating to 1994), involving his former private secretary. It was the first time that a national cabinet minister had been convicted of such a crime while serving in office.

In August 2007 the Delhi High Court dismissed Soren’s murder conviction, and a year later he again became the chief minister of Jharkhand. His tenure was again brief, as he failed to win a January 2009 by-election for a seat in the state legislature within the required six months of his appointment and had to resign. In December 2009 Soren took office as the chief minister of the state for a third time, after a JMM-BJP coalition government had been formed. He once more had to step down from the post after only six months, however, after the BJP withdrew its support and the government fell.

Meanwhile, Soren was cleared of the two long-standing murder charges still pending against him: in 2008 for the 1975 mob action, and in 2010 for the 1974 killing. His health, however, had begun to deteriorate by early 2009. Although he remained head of the party—he was elected to a sixth term as the JMM president in 2010—he paved the way for his son Hemant to assume a leadership role in the party. In 2020 Shibu was elected to the Rajya Sabha.