BJP wins 89 seats, JD(U) bags 85; RJD slips to 25 while Congress manages win in 6 seats
PATNA/NEW DELHI, Nov 14: The ruling NDA decimated the Mahagathbandhan in Bihar on Friday to retain power, reaffirming Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s enduring appeal and dealing a body blow to the Congress and ally RJD.
The massive scale of the victory of the NDA can be gauged from the fact that its two main constituents–BJP and JD(U)– clocked a nearly 85 per cent strike rate in 101 seats each they had contested.
The alliance secured a “200 paar” win for a three-fourths majority with the BJP emerging as the single largest party.
While the BJP won 89 seats, up from 74 in 2020, Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal(U) tasted success in 85 constituencies, up from 43.
The majority mark in the 243-member Assembly is 122.
The RJD slipped to 25 from 75, and Congress bagged only six out of the 61 seats it contested, down from 19.
One of the most striking features of this election was the extraordinary turnout of women voters.
The NDA also appeared to have done well in Muslim-dominated constituencies, signalling a possible change in voting pattern in these segments.
Strategist Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj Party (JSP), dubbed the “X factor” in the Bihar polls and whose candidates were in the fray in all but three of the seats, came a cropper.
In front of the residence of the chief minister, the JD(U)’s 75-year-old national president, party workers posed for photographs holding aloft posters with the caption “Tiger Abhi Zinda Hai” that neatly captured the gist of Kumar’s “neither tired nor in a mood to retire” stance.
He is Bihar’s longest serving chief minister, whilst also holding the post for his 9th term.
BJP’s performance would further cement its position as the numero uno political force in the country and also offset whatever setback that might have been caused by last year’s Lok Sabha polls when the party had to rely on allies to remain in power in the Centre.
The NDA’s tally in Bihar comes in the backdrop of the BJP’s back-to-back stunning performances in Delhi, Maharashtra and Haryana. Last year, the BJP had won 132 of the 149 seats it had contested in Maharashtra.
The LJP(RV), headed by Union minister Chirag Paswan, the self-declared “Hanuman” of the Prime Minister, which was left with only 28 candidates in the fray, with nomination papers of one of its nominees getting rejected during scrutiny, won 19 seats.
Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustani Awam Morcha and Rajya Sabha MP Upendra Kushwah’s Rashtriya Lok Morcha, both junior partners in the NDA, won five and four seats respectively.
The Mahagathbandhan, which includes the RJD, the Congress and three Left parties, faced a crushing defeat, notwithstanding surveys and opinion polls showing its Chief Ministerial candidate Tejashwi Yadav as the most preferred leader for the top post.
It was an embarrassing loss of face for the Congress, often seen as a “weak link” in the INDIA bloc. Rahul Gandhi’s poll campaign against the BJP that revolved around his vote theft allegations failed to garner any support.
Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, which has often been accused of being a “B-team” of the BJP, won five seats. (PTI)
