Champai Soren: JMM leader whose entry and exit as CM both dramatic

Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader Champai Soren’s appointment as the state chief minister in February to replace Hemant Soren was as dramatic as his exit from the post five months later.

Champai Soren, who once tilled fields with his father in a remote village in Jharkhand’s Saraikela-Kharsawan district, took oath as the chief minister on February 2, days after his predecessor Hemant Soren resigned, just before he was arrested by the ED in a money laundering case.

Hemant was released from jail on June 28 after the high court granted him bail, and on Wednesday, he was elected the party’s legislature party leader. Champai submitted his resignation letter to the governor as chief minister to pave the way for Hemant Soren, who was sworn in as the chief minister for the third time.

Sixty-seven-year-old tribal leader Champai Soren has earned the sobriquet ‘Jharkhand’s Tiger’ for his contribution to the long fight for the creation of a separate state in the 1990s. Jharkhand was created from the southern part of Bihar in 2000.

A matriculate from a government school, he started his political career by getting elected as an Independent MLA through a by-election from the Saraikela seat in undivided Bihar in 1991.

Four years later, he contested the assembly polls from the seat on the JMM ticket and defeated the BJP’s Panchu Tudu. In the 2000 assembly elections, the first one held in the state, he was defeated from the same constituency by the BJP’s Anant Ram Tudu. He regained the seat in 2005 by defeating the BJP candidate by a margin of only 880 votes.

Champai Soren won the subsequent elections in 2009, 2014 and 2019. He served as a cabinet minister in the BJP government headed by Arjun Munda between September, 2010 and January, 2013. When Hemant Soren formed his second government in the state in 2019, Champai Soren became the Minister of Food and Civil Supplies and Transport.

Financial assistance schemes for women in the age group of 21 and 50 years, 200 units of free electricity to domestic consumers and increasing healthcare cover to Rs 15 lakh for 33 lakh people were given shape during Champai Soren’s five-month short stint as the chief minister. Champai Soren got married at a young age and has four sons and three daughters.