LJP (RV) likely to call key meet to back Paswan's Assembly polls debut

The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) is likely to soon call a meeting of its executive members to formalise a proposal urging its president and Union minister Chirag Paswan to contest the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections.

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Sources said its leaders had met on May 30 in Bihar's Bikramganj, where hours later Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed a public meeting, to back the idea. Paswan himself was not in the meeting.

Importantly, party MP Arun Bharti said its members want Paswan to contest from a general category seat if he does decide to fight the Assembly polls instead of a constituency reserved for the Scheduled Castes, a path often chosen by leaders from the Dalit community.

This is aimed at sending out a message about his acceptance outside his core constituency and projecting him as a leader with wide appeal.

Bharti told PTI that Bihar is central to Paswan's politics and he has repeatedly spoken about his vision for the state's development, recalling the 'Bihar First Bihari First' agenda put forth by the Union minister.

"This can be better voiced if Paswan reiterates the agenda from the soil of Bihar and its Assembly," Bharti said, outlining the reason behind the clamour within the party for its main face to contest the Assembly polls, expected to be held in October-November.

The move is also being seen as muscle-flexing by this important constituent of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance in Bihar. It is third biggest NDA member after the BJP and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal (United).

Seat-sharing talks in the NDA, which is more crowded now than ever in the state, is yet to begin, and its constituents are positioning themselves ahead of what is likely to be a hard bargain.

The party founded by Ram Vilas Paswan, a prominent leader from the Dalit community, sees itself as crucial to the success of the ruling alliance in the state where the RJD-Congress-Left bloc is sensing an opportunity to unseat Kumar from power after two decades amid concerns about his fitness.

The LJP (RV) can summon a meeting of its national executive or state executive members to formalise the proposal for Chirag Paswan to contest the assembly polls.

Paswan's decision to walk out of the NDA in the 2020 Assembly polls and put up its candidates mostly against the JD(U) due to his differences with Kumar had cost the state's ruling party heavily, reducing it to a decidedly junior status to the BJP and putting the opposition within sniffing distance of power.

Though Paswan's party could also win only one seat and later suffered a split but has since recovered its political mojo and won all five Lok Sabha seats it contested in the 2024 elections.

Parties led by Union minister Jitan Ram Majhi and former Union minister Upendra Kushwaha are other NDA members in the state with 243-member Assembly.

A third term Lok Sabha MP, Paswan has never contested the Assembly poll but has of late expressed his keenness for the state politics.