PATNA, Oct 20: The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) on Monday announced its list of 143 candidates for the Bihar assembly polls, at least four of whom would end up contesting against nominees of the other INDIA bloc constituents.
The list was released hours before the filing of nomination papers for the second and final phase was to be over.
It put paid to rumours that the RJD was going to contest the Kutumba seat, currently held by state Congress president Rajesh Kumar Ram, which would have led to a full-blown face-off between the two allies.
Nonetheless, the party would end up contesting against the Congress in Vaishali, Lalganj and Kahalgaon, and against former state minister Mukesh Sahni’s Vikassheel Insan Party in Tarapur.
Earlier, the RJD had given the party symbol to Afzal Ali from Gaura Bauram, but the same has been withdrawn by party supremo Lalu Prasad, in favour of Santosh Sahni, the VIP’s national president who is the younger brother of its founder.
However, Afzal has filed his nomination papers and did not withdraw the same, prompting Prasad to write to the Chief Electoral Officer that his candidature “not be taken into consideration”.
RJD sources said while the cadre was likely to back Sahni in the polls, there would remain plenty of room for confusion as Afzal could campaign using the party symbol.
Notable among the candidates are Tejashwi Yadav (Raghopur), Alok Mehta (Ujiyarpur), Mukesh Raushan (Mahua) and Akhtarul Islam Shahin (Samastipur), all of whom will be defending their sitting seats.
RJD president Lalu Prasad’s personal aide Bhola Yadav, who had also won the Bahadurpur seat in 2015, but dropped five years later when the party lost the constituency to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s JD(U), will try to wrest it back from minister Madan Sahni.
Former Speaker Awadh Bihari Chaudhary, who was trounced by a JD(U) greenhorn in the Lok Sabha polls last year when he contested from Siwan, has been allowed to try and retain his sitting assembly seat of the same name.
Former education minister Chandrashekhar, who has been in the news for his controversial views on Hindu scriptures, has also been fielded from his sitting seat of Madhepura.
The ‘MY’ (Muslim-Yadav) support base of the party appears to have been kept in mind in the selection of candidates, though other backward castes and upper castes have also been given tickets.
The principal opposition party can also pride itself in having fielded 21 women, far more than its main rivals — the JD(U) and the BJP.
CONGRESS LIST
The Congress agreed to contest 61 seats in poll-bound Bihar, nine less than the number of constituencies where it had fought five years ago, but will end up contesting against INDIA bloc partners, like the RJD and the CPI, in several assembly segments, a leader of the opposition front said on Monday.
Vaishali, Lalganj, Kahalgaon, Rajapakad and Rosera are among the assembly seats where the Congress and the RJD would end up fighting with each other.
The Congress nominee will also fight against CPI’s candidate in Bachwara. Reacting to the situation, a senior Congress leader, on the condition of anonymity, said, “One can’t deny the fact that our top leadership failed to assess the ground situation and gave tickets to several candidates who did not deserve.”
He also said, “Take the example of the Barabigha assembly, Congress nominee Gajanand Prasad Sahi lost the assembly polls in 2020 with a margin of less than 200 votes and this time he was not given a ticket.”
The Congress leader also claimed that former MLA Amit Kumar Tunna from Riga and Jayesh Mangalam Singh from Bagaha have been given tickets by the party this time, even though they lost the last assembly polls with a huge margin of more than 25,000 votes.
JMM NOT TO CONTEST
Jharkhand’s ruling JMM on Monday announced that it would not contest the assembly elections in neighbouring Bihar, claiming that the decision was taken in the wake of a “political conspiracy” by its allies RJD and Congress, which deprived it of seats as part of the Mahagathbandhan.
Speaking to reporters, senior JMM leader Sudivya Kumar said his party will review the alliance in Jharkhand with the Congress and RJD, and give a befitting reply to the “snub”.
The announcement came barely two days after the Hemant Soren-led party said that it would go solo in Bihar and contest the elections in six assembly segments as the seat-sharing talks failed.
“The RJD and the Congress are responsible for depriving JMM from contesting the election as part of a political conspiracy. JMM will give a befitting reply to this, and review its alliance with RJD and Congress,” said Kumar, the state tourism minister. (PTI)
