Congress has accused Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM of undermining its vote base in Bihar’s crucial Seemanchal region to aid the BJP, which is shaping up to be the state’s largest party. Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, a senior congressional leader, described Owaisi as a “vote cutter” and called on secular parties to be “vigilant” about him.
“BJP’s tact when using (Asaduddin) Owaisi sahab ‘s party in the Bihar elections has been successful to some extent. All secular parties should be on the lookout for vote cutter Owaisi sahab“was quoted by the ANI news agency.
Owaisi’s party had run 14 candidates in the region, which has a sizeable Muslim population. The JDU-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) is leading in several of the region’s seats.
AIMIM is also leading some seats in the region, dashing Congress’ hopes of sweeping elections here.
At the time of writing, the NDA led 124 seats and the opposition alliance 110, as shown by the Bihar counting trends. The BJP leads in 75 seats, the JDU in 41. The RJD is ahead in 72 seats, Congress in 20 and the CPI-ML in 11 seats.
The projections do not match the expectations of the opposition alliance, especially after exit polls predicted an easy victory.
However, the alliance led by Tejashwi Yadav is giving a tough battle to the ruling coalition. With several rounds of counting remaining, the electoral contest is expected to go to the end.
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