Nitish, Shah discuss seat-sharing strategy for poll-bound Bihar

Political chessboard has been laid in Bihar where top leaders of the ruling alliance — Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of Janata Dal (United) and Home Minister Amit Shah of the BJP — formally met for the first time today to discuss poll strategy.

The meeting, held at a high-end Patna hotel, was being closely watched because Nitish, a habitual defector of camps, had not met BJP chief JP Nadda, who was in Patna recently. Importantly, today was the first time Nitish met Shah since joining the NDA to form his government in Bihar last year.

The leaders are said to have discussed the broad contours of the seat sharing with JD(U), with sources indicating that the party had demanded at least one seat more than the BJP.

This arithmetic, the JD(U) leaders say, is critical to maintaining JD(U)’s symbolic superiority in a fast-emerging BJP.

As per the current party position in the Bihar Assembly, the BJP is the single largest party in the ruling 131-member NDA bloc with 80 seats out of 243; JD(U) has 45, Jitan Ram Majhi’s Hindustan Awam Morcha has four.

The Opposition has 111 MLAs with RJD at 77, Congress at 19; CPI (ML) at 11, CPM two and CPI two.

The sources said the larger agreement was on the BJP contesting 100; JD(U) 101 and the rest being divided among allies — LJP, HAM and Rashtriya Lok Morcha of Upendra Kushwaha.

The LJP’s Chirag Paswan has been flexing his muscle amid seat-sharing talks and has demanded 45 seats, but BJP sources say the maximum the Hajipur MP could get was 20 to 25.

In the 2020 Assembly elections in Bihar, the LJP was not part of the NDA. It contested alone and spoilt the chances of JD(U) in many seats.

The Opposition’s Mahagathbandhan has made Election Commission’s ongoing special intensive revision of electoral rolls in Bihar its principal poll plank, with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi pressing ahead with vote theft allegations. The EC has rejected the charges.