The ruling Janata Dal-United’s (JD-U) demand for a 50-50 seat sharing split in the upcoming State Legislative Council poll to 24 seats was rejected by its alliance partner, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), on Thursday. The BJP said the demand, made by the JD(U)’s parliamentary board chairman Upendra Kushwaha, had “no significance”.
“Even in the last State Assembly poll and Parliament elections, the seat distribution between both alliance parties [the JD-U and the BJP] was more or less on a 50-50 formula. So, in the upcoming council poll too, this formula of equal number of seats should be applied,” Mr. Kushwaha had said.
However, senior State BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Tarkishore Prasad rejected the demand and said “it holds no significance”. “The top party leadership of both the allies will decide on the seat distribution formula,” he said. State BJP president Sanjay Jaiswal added, “It is the BJP’s central parliamentary committee that will take a final decision on the issue.”
Out of the 24 seats falling vacant, 13 are currently with the BJP, eight are held by the JD(U), two are with the RJD, and one seat is with the Congress. The poll is likely to be held in March
Other alliance partners of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in Bihar, the Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular (HAM-S) led by former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi, and the Vikashil Insaan Party (VIP), have also announced they will contest the council polls.
HAM(S) leader and spokesperson Danish Rizwan said his party would contest “at least the two seats of Sitamarhi and Gaya at any cost”. “We will rethink our strategy if our demands are not met,” Mr. Rizwan added.
“Our party has demanded four seats to contest. If we are not adjusted in the distribution of seats, we will contest all 24 seats,” the VIP’s president Mukesh Sahni said.
In the Opposition mahagathbandhan (grand alliance), Congress party leaders said they were waiting for a decision on seat-sharing from the top party leadership, and were hopeful they would contest at least seven out of the 24 seats in the council poll.
Cracks appeared in the alliance between the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in the recently held bypoll to the two Assembly seats of Tarapur in Munger district and Kusheshwarsthan in Darbhanga district. Both parties had contested both seats against each other and lost to the JD(U)’s candidates, with the Congress’s candidates even forfeiting their deposits.
“Alliance or no alliance, our party is ready to contest the upcoming State council poll on all 24 seats,” a Congress leader said, without wishing to be named.
“The RJD and Congress may contest the poll separately as they did in recently bypoll to two Assembly seats, but the JD(U) and BJP cannot afford to go solo because their alliance suits both in equal measure and there’s hardly any room for either to manoeuvre. They just trigger political speculations to bargain for more seats between themselves,” political commentator Ajay Kumar said.
The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) faction led by Chirag Paswan recently said that his party would go solo in the council poll. “There are several big parties in the State but only we have the courage to go alone in the poll,” Mr. Paswan said.