Jitan Ram Manjhi has persuaded the BJP to part with a few more seats than the senior partner had brought to the negotiation table. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will be fighting the polls on 160 seats, while the allies have been given 83 seats.
After multiple meetings, BJP chief Amit Shah announced how his party and its three regional allies will divide seats in Bihar: Ramvilas Paswan’s Lok Jan Shakti Party will contest 40, Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Samata Party will contest 23 seats and Jitan Ram Manhji’s newly minted Hindustani Awaam Morcha (Secular), also called HAM, will contest 20.
Standing together showing their camaraderie, alliance partners in the NDA – BJP’s Amit Shah joined hands with LJP leader Ram Vilas Paswan, RLSP leader Upendra Kushwaha, HAM’s Jitan Ram Manjhi, among several other senior leaders.
The announcement had been delayed several times as Manjhi played hardball and insisted on contesting many more seats than his party was initially allotted.
Mr. Shah said a few people from Mr Manjhi’s party will also contest as BJP candidates, rejecting reports of squabbles over seats. “There is no tug of war in the NDA over seat sharing,” Mr. Shah said as he announced after a fairly aggressive tussle over the weekend.
“All constituents of the BJP-led NDA have decided to contest the Bihar polls together under the leadership of PM Narendra Modi. NDA is confident of big victory in the polls.” Shah said.
NDA is confident of winning a two-third majority in the Bihar polls. We are confident that the people of Bihar will prefer NDA over misleading and corrupt Nitish Kumar government here, the BJP chief said.
The BJP national president also took a dig at the ‘grand alliance’ floated by Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, SP chief Mulyaam Singh Yadav and others.
The ‘grand alliance’ floated by Nitish and Lalu has fallen apart. One of the top leaders (Mulayam Singh) of the alliance is not with them, Shah said.
It’s time that Bihar votes for development, for which voting for NDA is essential, Amit Shah said.
Attacking the Bihar Chief Minister, Shah said, “Nitish Kumar is promising crime free Bihar while allying with corrupt Congress and Lalu Prasad who is representative of ‘jungle raj’”.
As far as development in Bihar is concerned I want to make it clear that Nitish Kumar’s statistics are until when BJP was with him. He is misleading the people of Bihar with inaccurate facts, Shah said.
Ever since our party ‘BJP’ exited the Bihar govt, the state has seen the jungle rule, Shah added.
Shah said, “PM Modi had announced a special package for Bihar but Nitish Kumar did not even thank him for this.”
