3 party nominees withdrew under BJP coercion: Kishor

Jan Suraaj founder Prashant Kishor has alleged that the BJP exerted pressure and forced three of his party nominees to withdraw from the Bihar Assembly poll contest.

“Three of my candidates were pressured by the BJP to withdraw — either through their relatives or friends. The BJP does not fear the Mahagathbandhan. It fears the sort of people fielded by my party,” he said, charging Union ministers Amit Shah and Dharmendra Pradhan with being instrumental in the withdrawal.

“The BJP did the same thing in the 2024 Lok Sabha poll when the Congress candidate pulled out in Surat and the saffron party had an unchallenged victory. This is a threat to democracy. People responded by curbing the BJP to 240 seats in the LS poll. In the Bihar Assembly poll too, it will face defeat as a majority of the migrant labourers coming to the state to celebrate Chhath are in favour of my party,” he claimed.

The three candidates Kishor referred to are Akhilesh Saha, who was picked by the party for the Danapur Assembly seat and did the vanishing act before the filing of nomination; Dr Satya Prakash Tiwari, party’s candidate from the Brahapur Assembly seat who withdrew his papers in favour of LJP candidate Hulas Pandey; and Shashi Shekhar Sinha, party candidate from Gopalganj who withdrew his nomination papers.

Kishor, who had announced that he would fight all 243 Assembly seats, is now left with 240 candidates.

Meanwhile, a day after the filing of nomination papers for the second phase ended, the issue of seat sharing in the Mahagathbandhan is still not clear. Till Tuesday evening, there were 255 candidates of the alliance for the 243 seats after the Congress withdrew from a few seats.

The NDA had announced its seat-sharing formula on October 12 and by October 16, all its partners had announced their candidates. On the other hand, the Mahagathbandhan is officially yet to announce its seat-sharing formula.

The RJD had officially released its list of 143 candidates on October 20, while the Congress released five lists and the VIP two. There will be “friendly fights” for the Mahagathbandhan on 12 seats if the allies do not back off. The only thing common between the NDA and the Mahagathbandhan is that there is no CM face officially.

Union minister Amit Shah undertook a damage-control exercise by getting rebel candidates to withdraw and pacify the agitated allies. In the Mahagathbandhan, there has been no such exercise.

The NDA has started its campaign with Amit Shah already having addressed two public meetings. CM Nitish Kumar addressed his first public meeting on October 1 and held another meeting in Muzaffarpur on October 21.

UP CM Yogi Adityanath addressed two public meetings on October 16, while Maharashtra CM Devendra Fernavis and Madhya Pradesh CM Mohan Yadav have also addressed public meetings.

In sharp contrast, the Mahagathbandhan is yet to start its election campaign.