Updated: September 29, 2020 8:58:16 am
Bharatiya Janata Party Chairman JP Nadda points to ‘Aatmanirbhar Bihar’ campaign vans ahead of Assembly elections in Patna. (Photo / PTI Archive)
Just two days before the submission of nominations for the first phase of voting begins, there is no clarity on the shape of the NDA and Grand Alliance fields.
While the LJP is likely to respond to a call on whether it will remain in the NDA on Wednesday, on Monday the RJD offered 58 seats to Congress against its demand for 80 seats.
The BJP reportedly offered 22-25 seats to the LJP, but the party’s state unit has finalized 143 likely candidates should it compete alone.
Decisions to share seats in the NDA are on hold because the LJP is not yet determined to resign from the alliance. A BJP source said: “LJP could get a maximum of 22-25 seats. You have to take a final call, as our top leaders have almost had final conversations about sharing seats with JD (U). But it is not known if the BJP will contest the same number of seats as JD (U), or if the latter will continue as the main partner in Bihar. “
Read | Bihar elections – RLSP, BSP, AIMIM: hint of a third front
LJP Chief Secretary General Abdul Khaliq told The Indian Express: “The party has authorized its national president, Chirag Paswan, to make a final decision in one or two days. We will all support the decision you make. “
When asked four of the six LJP MPs who were reportedly interested in remaining in the NDA, Khaliq said: “These are hoaxes. All the legislators have authorized Chirag to make a decision ”.
Meanwhile, the stance in the RJD-led Grand Alliance has led to the possibility of an RJD-Congress-Left-JMM alliance. RJD spokesperson Mrityunjay Tewari told The Indian Express: “We have made it clear to Congress that RJD can offer you 58 seats. We also offer you the Valmiki Nagar Lok Sabha seat. We are waiting for your response “.
While Congress has not officially reacted, a senior Congress leader said: “If the Vikas-sheel Insaan Party (VIP) is not in the Grand Alliance, we will get at least 75 seats. We are in final talks ”.
RJD looks to revive, Cong keeps the pressure
The RJD has been quite clear in contesting a large portion of the seats in an attempt to revive the game. He believes his alliance partners are often unable to transfer votes, so Tejashwi Yadav wants to contest the maximum number of seats, preferably 140-150. Congress, which has 27 seats, knows the RJD game but has kept the pressure on the main partner to extract 70-75 seats, which is considered a respectable number.
Sources said that while they expect the RJD and Congress to reach an understanding quickly, there is a sticking point of 10-15 seats.
A senior congressional leader told The Indian Express that while there were some difficulties in “negotiations”, these were normal before the elections. “Even the NDA alliance is not established, with the LJP undecided. So it is not worrisome. We have a list of 75 seats that Congress wants to contest, ”said the Congress leader.
This 75-seat number, however, leaves 168 seats in a 243-member Assembly for the RJD and other alliance partners, including left-wing parties. “The RJD has been saying that it does not want to contest less than 140 seats. That leaves very little to keep the alliance members happy, “said the leader.
Three left-wing parties, CPI (ML), CPI and CPM, are likely to win 23 seats and JMM two, RJD sources said. “CPI (ML) could get 12-15 seats due to a larger presence and three MLA seats,” said a source from RJD.
In three previous elections, the CPI (ML) had a higher percentage of votes than the other two left-wing parties.
CPI (ML) leaders told The Indian Express that the prospects for an alliance looked bleak at the moment. A senior leader said: “Our seat-sharing talks with the RJD remain unsuccessful. The nominations will begin soon, and we are preparing to present them from all our main seats without expecting any possible progress, which seems quite bleak. “
The leader added: “There are three possibilities. One is a total alliance. The second is a partial alliance, which can see some friendly fights. And the third is that we fight alone, which we have been doing all along. The problem is that they (RJD) do not want to give up most of the seats where we are based. In addition, for the first phase they offered only 4 to 5 places. That is unacceptable. “
Meanwhile, the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) suffered a setback when its state president, Bhudeo Choudhary, joined the RJD. RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha has reportedly been trying to negotiate with the NDA.
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